Bill to outlaw Wednesday night school sports passes Kansas Senate | Opinion
Public schools may be legally separate from churches, but the Kansas Senate has recently passed a bill to make it illegal for school activities to compete with Wednesday evening church youth groups.
Senate Bill 515 would legally ban sports competition and practices (and a wide variety of other activities) on Wednesday evenings along with all day Sunday, five days around Christmas, the four days of Holy Week beginning with Maundy Thursday and continuing through Easter, and the week around the 4th of July.
“It’s a sad day that we have to legislate this,” said Sen. Caryn Tyson, a Republican from Parker. “Years ago it wasn’t even an issue, it was a standard and acceptable, but here we are.”
So, where are we exactly?
School activities are governed by a private nonprofit organization called the Kansas State High School Activities Association.
KSHSAA is best known for its role in sports, but also oversees interscholastic competition in music, cheerleading, debate, speech, drama and Scholar’s Bowl.
Under KSHSAA rules, Sundays are already off the table for school activities. Ditto for Christmas break. And the 4th of July always falls in what’s known as the summertime “Dead Week,” this year, June 29 to July 5.
So essentially, what the Senate is talking about is enshrining those existing no-play-or-practice dates in state law, and adding Wednesday evenings and the three days before Easter.
SB 515 started out as a bill to basically open a transfer portal for homeschool student-athletes to play for private schools, (they can already play for public schools).
The ban on Easter Week and Wednesday night activities wasn’t part of the public hearing on the bill, because it was offered as a floor amendment by Republican Sen. Chase Blasi of Wichita.
“It’s come to my attention in the last week or so from my district, concern about activities that are sponsored by schools that continue to . . . interrupt family time, and if you’re a person of faith, church time,” he explained.
Sen. Marci Francisco, a Lawrence Democrat, (we all know what they’re like) asked Blasi “What religions were considered in identifying the dates of these moratoriums?”
Blasi ducked the question.
“Not any particular religion was considered,” he replied. “This was just in response to constituents at home who participate in various religious backgrounds who have things, activities on Wednesday evenings . . . who have been interrupted by activities that continue to be scheduled on Wednesday nights or practices that continue to run longer and longer.”
Rising in support of the amendment, Republican Sen. Brad Starnes of Riley was more to the point: “The bedrock of our country is based upon religism, and I just want to continue to have that strong bedrock.”
I’m really hoping he either misspoke or doesn’t know what “religism” is. The word actually means religious prejudice.
I can’t tell you how many school activities would have to be moved to keep Wednesday evenings open for church activities.
Just looking at Wednesday this week around the Wichita area, I found several baseball, softball, soccer and swimming events that could overlap.
I also can’t give you a number for how many of those kids would actually be at a church youth group if they weren’t participating in school activities. The best we can do is estimate.
According to the Pew Research Center, 48% of Kansans identify as Protestant (23% are evangelical and 18% mainline). The state is 19% Catholic and 28% have no religious affiliation.
A study by Lifeway Research found that 53% of Protestant churches nationwide (including my own) hold weekly youth group activities on Wednesday evenings.
I couldn’t find similar statistics for the various other faith traditions, including Catholic and Orthodox churches, as well as the Jewish and Muslim faiths. But looking at scheduled youth events around the area for those other congregations, they don’t seem to be particularly wedded to Wednesday nights.
So, for the 53% of the 48%, (roughly a quarter of Kansans), we’re contemplating outlawing all Wednesday evening school activities so they don’t conflict with their church activities.
I can’t help thinking if any other minority group made such a request for special treatment, the majority of Kansas senators would call that an example of DEI — diversity, equity and inclusion — and tell said minority to pound sand.
I also can’t help thinking, “Haven’t the Protestant Christians of Kansas been discriminated against enough?” I mean, seriously, there are still some big-box retail stores where the checkers say “happy holidays” instead of “merry Christmas.”
The struggle continues.
