Following the Army football team’s season-opening win over Temple, the team had a wild celebration in the locker room. Unfortunately, West Point is investigating that celebration for a possible violation of the First Amendment.
During the celebration, the team can be seen kneeling in prayer with their hands on their teammates shoulder.
That would be a violation of the players’ religious freedom and apparently Military Religious Freedom Foundation president Mikey Weinstein was approached by a number of cadets.
“In this case, Coach Monken chose the wrong time, the wrong place, and the wrong manner,” Weinstein told the Associated Press.
“He can’t tell anybody, put your hand on someone and let’s pray. You can’t do it, particularly when you’re the head coach of a public school. We assume that there’s going to be an apology from the coach to the team.We are assuming there’s an admission there was a misstep.”
When Air Force faced a similar situation after facing criticism for some players kneeling for prayer before the game, everyone was cleared as it was found to be within their rights.
The same should happen here, with the coach issuing an apology.
Following news of the investigation into the postgame prayer, Army removed video of the locker room celebration and edited out the full prayer. You can still see the players standing from the kneeled position once the prayer concluded.
You can view the celebration below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Rl7buEIEak
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