Christianity Today

More responses on the Pledge case

Christian organizations' responses to the Supreme Court's "under God" ruling have slowed to a trickle, but division continues. (See yesterday's Weblog if you missed remarks from most of the biggies.)

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins sides with Focus on the Family's James Dobson, the Rutherford Institute's John Whitehead, and a few others in lamenting that the Court based its decision on Michael Newdow's legal standing, not on the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance. "I believe the Supreme Court should have used this opportunity to uphold the right of school children to recite the Pledge of Allegiance," Perkins said. "Look for more atheists to come out of the closet in the near future with new attacks on the Pledge. The High Court will not be able to sidestep this issue for long."

Concerned Women for America's Jan LaRue, however, has expanded her earlier comment praising the ruling. "The Court's ruling on the issue of standing is by no means 'just a technicality,'" she says. Her analysis is headlined with a praise for the Court's "pledge for parental rights and judicial restraint."

The Catholic League says the decision is imperfect, but good enough. "It is too bad that the substantive issue of whether recitations of the Pledge in school are legal wasn't addressed," says William Donohue. "It is regrettable only because there is a concerted effort in this country, led by organizations that are openly hostile to religion, to eliminate all public vestiges of our religious heritage." That effort "must be stopped dead in its tracks" rather than merely thwarted, he says. Still, he enthuses, "This is not a good day for the radical secularists. Which is why it is such a good day ...

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