Letter: Keep religion out of graduation ceremonies

A decade after co-authoring the First Amendment, Thomas Jefferson received a letter from the Baptist community of Danbury, Conn. — a religious minority at that time — expressing their fear of religious persecution by the Congregationalists of Connecticut.

In his immortal response, Jefferson reassured them that there will forever be a “wall of separation between church and state” in order to protect churches from the decisions of the state as well as the state from the decisions of the churches.

Public schools/universities exist to educate, not to proselytize. People in attendance of a graduation ceremony are a captive audience. Making any religious ceremony an official part of the school day is coercive and invasive.

The USC system of schools — and many other public institutions in our state — are currently choosing to disregard this “wall of separation,” effectively turning multicultural, secular, inclusive, public university graduation ceremonies into church sermons.

Instead of having voluntary religious meetings before/after the ceremony, USCB has decided to open and close all graduation ceremonies with sectarian prayers, forcing all in attendance to sit through messages that are irrelevant to higher education. This distraction is not secular, inclusive, or multicultural in any way, and it serves to undermine individually-held belief systems of religious minorities in attendance.

I fully support everyone’s right to practice their religion freely and openly, but public university graduations should be focused on the accomplishments of the graduating class and not on the religious beliefs of the board or administrators.

This story was originally published April 27, 2016 at 6:30 PM with the headline "Letter: Keep religion out of graduation ceremonies."