School district backs off violating student's free speech, religious freedom rights
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Sabrina Steffans displays her newly decorated school parking space. / Credit: Courtesy of First Liberty InstituteCNA Staff, Aug 28, 2025 / 15:53 pm (CNA).A rising senior at a high school in Grand Island, New York, Sabrina Steffans, is now allowed to decorate her school parking space with Christian messages after her high school reversed course after initially rejecting her faith-based artwork.Grand Island High School allows seniors to paint their parking spots "to encourage students to express themselves through positive artwork, to beautify the campus, to build school spirit, and to create a new and exciting radiation to support senior class activities and events."When Steffans, a Christian who leads a Bible club at her school, proposed three drawings for her parking space, the school rejected the first two, which had Christian themes.Steffans said the school approved the third design, "which had no Bible verses, no crosses, or anything."Steffans said after the school rejected...
Sabrina Steffans displays her newly decorated school parking space. / Credit: Courtesy of First Liberty Institute
CNA Staff, Aug 28, 2025 / 15:53 pm (CNA).
A rising senior at a high school in Grand Island, New York, Sabrina Steffans, is now allowed to decorate her school parking space with Christian messages after her high school reversed course after initially rejecting her faith-based artwork.
Grand Island High School allows seniors to paint their parking spots "to encourage students to express themselves through positive artwork, to beautify the campus, to build school spirit, and to create a new and exciting radiation to support senior class activities and events."
When Steffans, a Christian who leads a Bible club at her school, proposed three drawings for her parking space, the school rejected the first two, which had Christian themes.
Steffans said the school approved the third design, "which had no Bible verses, no crosses, or anything."
Steffans said after the school rejected the second proposed drawing, "that's when we kind of decided to take charge and move forward with this [legal action]."
Steffans hired lawyers from First Liberty Institute, a nonprofit religious liberty law firm, who wrote a demand letter to the Grand Island school district insisting she had a constitutionally-protected right to freely express her religious beliefs at school.
Days later, attorneys for the school district responded to the demand letter stating that Sabrina could proceed with her original design.
"We are pleased that the school district changed course and will allow Sabrina to truly express her deeply held beliefs in her design," said Keisha Russell, senior counsel for First Liberty Institute. "The First Amendment protects students' private expressions of faith in public schools."
In response to the threatened lawsuit, Grand Island Central School District Superintendent Brian Graham issued a statement last week saying the district takes "seriously our responsibility to uphold constitutional principles, including the First Amendment."
He continued: "While we strongly dispute any assertion that our policies or decisions violated the rights of any student, the board of education and district leadership, after careful consultation with legal counsel, have decided that the student in question will be permitted to proceed with her original senior parking space design."
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Father James Martin, SJ. / Credit: Flickr by Shawn (CC BY-NC 2.0)Vatican City, Sep 1, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).Pope Leo XIV met in a private audience with Father James Martin, S.J., at the Vatican on Monday.Martin, who is in Rome to lead a Jubilee pilgrimage for his LGBTQ ministry, Outreach, also had one-on-one audiences with Pope Francis on at least two occasions.The Vatican does not customarily comment on papal audiences with individuals and the Holy See Press Office did not immediately respond to a request for information about the meeting.Responding to a request for comment from CNA, Martin wrote: "I was honored and grateful to meet with the Holy Father this morning in an audience in the Apostolic Palace, and heard the same message I heard from Pope Francis on LGBTQ people, which is one of openness and welcome: 'Todos, todos, todos.' I found the Pope serene, joyful and encouraging."The Jesuit priest, an author and editor at large at America Media, is the founder of Outreach, w...
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null / Credit: GBALLGIGGSPHOTO/ShutterstockCNA Staff, Sep 1, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).A recent study found that the rate of mental-health-related hospitalizations doubled for women who had abortions compared with women who gave birth. The study, published this summer in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, compared abortions with other pregnancies in hospitals in Quebec, Canada, between 2006 and 2022, tracking data on women for up to 17 years.The study, which compared more than 1.2 million women who gave birth in Quebec hospitals with more than 28,000 women who had abortions, found that "rates of mental-health-related hospitalization were higher following induced abortions than other pregnancies." Abortion was associated with a number of mental-health-related difficulties including hospitalization for psychiatric disorders, substance use disorders, and suicide attempts, the study found.This association was especially high for women who were younger than 25 years at the t...
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Members of St. Francis' Work for the Poor, wearing t-shirts with the phrase "a helping hand to man every day," with the Holy Father in the Vatican's Clementine Hall. / Credit: Vatican MediaVatican City, Sep 1, 2025 / 09:47 am (CNA).Pope Leo XIV on Monday welcomed members of the Opera San Francesco per i Poveri ("St. Francis' Work for the Poor") to the Vatican, thanking the society for their witness of charity according to the Franciscan tradition. "When you see a poor person," the Holy Father said, recalling the words of St. Francis of Assisi, "you are placed before the mirror of the Lord and his poor Mother.""Likewise, in the sick, know how to see the infirmities with which Jesus took on himself," he added. Each year, the Opera San Francesco per i Poveri provides a wide variety of services to more than 30,000 people. Their charitable works include managing cafeterias and health clinics, as well as providing job counseling and psychological support for thos...
