When the school district in a small Georgia town decided the cheerleaders at the local public high school could no longer display Bible verses on their signs, the entire town went into an enraged uproar. Local churches held protest rallies, thousands of t-shirts were printed, signs proclaiming "You Can't Silence Us" were posted locally and beyond.
I think the town was kind of missing the point here. One girl quoted in the article said "We have the right to believe whatever religion we want," as if she was not being allowed to follow her religion. The right to proclaim her beliefs was not even threatened, much less the right to believe. Students could still pray together and fans could still bring those "John 3:16" signs to games.
The problem was the context of the display. If the members of the swim team meditate together between classes no one would complain, but if the swim team decides to put a picture of Buddha on their Speedos, it gets a little murky.
Christianity at the football games was not suppressed, it was sparked. The predominantly Christian town had something to rally against, and they got to champion freedom of speech in the process.
But no one was in the wrong. The school district did the right thing in putting a stop to the lawsuit-worthy brand of religion, without trying to actually muzzle religion itself.
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