Kountze High School cheerleader Grace Walton works on her sign next to a finished one Wednesday in Kountze, Texas. The small Hardin County community is rallying behind the high school's cheerleaders after the squad members were told they could not use scripture verses on their signs at the football games.
Most people in Kountze viewed the banners as evidence of the students’ admirable moral upbringing — Christianity and the Bible always had been fundamental to this town of 2,100.
But someone complained to a foundation that fights for the separation of church and state, and by Tuesday, a day after receiving a letter from the Freedom From Religion Foundation, the superintendent banned the banners, and the town became embroiled in a controversy that has touched other communities nationwide.
On Thursday, a judge granted a request by the nonprofit Liberty Institute law firm to temporarily bar the implementation of the ban. It also set a hearing for early October when the sides will be able to make their arguments. The cheerleaders planned to raise their 20-foot banners at Thursday evening’s junior varsity football game.
People in the town 90 miles northeast of Houston talk of little else. Parents and students have plastered pictures of the banners — some of which quote scripture, declaring “I can do all things through Christ that strengthens me” — on their Facebook pages. A Facebook group created after the ban, Support Kountze Kids Faith, had more than 35,100 members by early Thursday.
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