Officials at a California public grade school who dispatched a sheriff’s deputy to stop a 7-year-old from sharing Bible verses with his classmates because someone could be “offended” now are being warned of “civil rights violations.”
The student regularly shared notes from his mother containing Bible verses that were tucked into his lunch at Desert Rose Elementary School in the Palmdale, California, School District, which declined to respond to a WND request for comment.
A media spokesman for the sheriff’s office told WND he knew nothing about the deputy visiting the 7-year-old’s home at the request of school officials and declined to comment.
But Liberty Counsel, a nonprofit litigation, education, and policy group emphasizing religious liberties, has sent a letter to the school regarding its “unconstitutional suppression and censorship of student religious speech.”
The organization said it demanded that Desert Rose “correct an outrageous violation of a first grader’s constitutional rights.”
“The situation started with an encouraging note and Bible verse from mom Christina Zavala, tucked into a packed lunch for her little boy (‘C’),” Liberty Counsel explained. “The seven-year-old boy read the note and verse, and showed them to his friends during lunch time at school.”