Students told to stop praying in front of US Supreme Court

In another stunning example of just how far things have gone in our country when it comes to government's hostility to religion, a group of students were told by officials to stop praying outside of the US Supreme Court.

The group of 15 Christian school students, there on a trip from Arizona, were confronted by a Supreme Court police officer and told that their praying was against the law.

According to a spokesman with the Alliance Defense Fund, the officer's interruption of their prayer was "abrupt", and that "they were told to stop praying because they were violating the law and they had to take their prayer elsewhere".

They did.  They moved down to the sidewalk and stood in the gutter.

Via Fox News:

The students were part of a junior high school American History class at Wickenburg Christian Academy in Arizona. After taking pictures on the steps of the Supreme Court building, their teacher gathered them to a side location where they formed a circle and began to pray. ...

A spokesperson for the Court said the Marshal of the Court will look into the events alleged by the ADF.

“The Court does not have a policy prohibiting prayer,” said public information officer Kathy Arberg in an email to FOX News Radio.

Of course it's true that the Supreme Court doesn't have such a "policy", but that's really not the point here.  The problem is that government has, slowy but surely, become so adversarial and inhospitable to religion in our country that it's easy to see how a security officer might get the impression that a group of kids praying on government property might be breaking the law.

And when you account for the general attitudes in the media, academia and popular culture when it comes to religion and this becomes even less of a shock.  All of which should tell you something about our country.