Fellowship of Christian Athletes goes to bat for volunteers
Liberties
by Steve West
Post Date:
August 14, 2026
Fellowship of Christian Athletes goes to bat for volunteers
The Christian sports ministry claims a New Jersey school district discriminated against religious student groups
The offices of the Hopewell Valley Regional School District in Pennington New Jersey Creative Commons / Wikimedia Commons / Photo by Mr. Matté
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When New Jersey mom Jennifer DiDonato took to the podium at a Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education meeting last October, she likely didn’t expect the issue she brought up would lead to a monthslong dispute—and ultimately a lawsuit in federal court.
At the meeting, DiDonato asked the board about new policies blocking adult volunteers from attending Fellowship of Christian Athletes events in district schools. “I’d just like to better understand why the FCA volunteers cannot come into the school,” she told the board. “Can you explain this to our kids and to our audience tonight?”
A board member told DiDonato and her son, who also attended the meeting, that the Freedom From Religion Foundation had threatened to sue the school district. As a result, attorneys had advised against the use of adult volunteers. “You cannot have someone coming [from] outside with the religious clubs,” the attorneys had instructed, according to the board.
On Tuesday, the festering dispute came to a head, as both the national organization and school chapters of FCA filed a federal lawsuit that challenges what they contend is an unlawful and unnecessary school policy. They argue it also discriminates against religious student clubs, in that the district still allows adult volunteers to participate in other nonreligious student clubs.
Before the start of the 2025-26 school year, the Trenton-area school district announced that adult volunteers could not attend FCA chapters, or “huddles,” that met at Hopewell Valley Central High School and Timberlane Middle School. The student-led groups met during the lunch hour for Bible study, prayer, and discussion. Adults contributed pizza, snacks, and drinks and sat in on the discussions.
Tuesday’s complaint, which the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed on FCA’s behalf, contends that the school district’s targeting of religious clubs violates both free exercise and free speech guarantees of the First Amendment. It also claims the school’s exclusionary policy violates the Equal Access Act, a federal law that guarantees equal treatment of noncurriculum-related student groups, and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, a public accommodations law that bars religious discrimination.
The policy is only constitutional if it is both neutral and generally applicable, but it’s neither, according to the complaint. It’s not neutral since it focuses on groups that are religious in character, the FCA says. The organization also argues that the policy is not generally applicable since nonreligious groups continue to host adult volunteers, such as “adult mentors” for the school robotics team or adult volunteers giving presentations at Youth Environmental Society lunches.
Hopewell Valley Regional School District did not respond to my request for comment.
The Equal Access Act, a bipartisan law that Congress enacted in 1984, says that federally funded secondary schools that allow noncurriculum-related student groups to meet on campus cannot discriminate against groups because of their religious, political, or philosophical views. Religious groups and LGBTQ-advocacy groups often benefit from the law.
The student ministry has faced off with school administrators before. After a yearslong battle, a federal appeals court in 2023 handed FCA a victory after a San Jose, Calif., high school “derecognized” the club because it required its leaders to agree to a statement of faith. A federal judge shut down a similar move school officials made in Washington, D.C., in 2024.
Brad Jacob, a constitutional law scholar at Regent University School of Law and a former staff member of the Christian Legal Society, recalled the role that CLS played in getting the law through Congress and its continued vigilance to see it enforced. He argued the Hopewell Valley case wasn’t even a close call but was a “blatant violation” of the law.
“The Equal Access Act makes this so totally clear,” he said. “You may not discriminate against a student-led organization on the basis of religion or philosophy or political views, and the school district is exactly doing that.” Jacob did caution that outside volunteers, coaches, and teachers could not lead meetings, which had to be student-run.
Becket counsel Joseph Davis said there was no evidence to support school officials’ misimpression that adult volunteers were leading the meetings and not just serving in an advisory role. He said the “notion that somehow it’s outside adults that are orchestrating these groups—that’s entirely wrong.” He said that adults provided important mentorship and guidance—something other nonreligious groups, and even the school district itself, encourages.
It’s also a critical need, said Vince Purpero, who, along with his wife Karen, have served student athletes in ministry for over 40 years—for most of that time with Cru’s Student Venture. They continue to serve youth through another ministry from their base in Xenia, Ohio. Purpero said that adults serve as role models for children and teens, many of whom come from fatherless or otherwise dysfunctional homes broken by drug abuse, alcoholism, abuse, and divorce.
“What I love about it is they’re all uniquely gifted and wired, so they might bring a discussion or a personality, or some kind of strength, or a character quality—it’s kind of like we’re all teaming up and working together,” he said. “These people in the right way are reinforcing the heart of what an existing parent may not be able to get through to a kid, or maybe reach a kid that doesn’t have a parent.”
Becket’s Davis said that FCA pursued litigation with the school district as a last recourse, after spending much of the last school year trying to reach an out-of-court resolution. He hopes that the matter can be resolved before the new school year commences.
“Now that their students have missed out on a full year of the valuable mentorship and guidance that adult supporters can provide to high school students, and with another school year approaching, they had to get this sorted out,” Davis said.
School starts Sept. 1.
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Steve is a reporter on First Amendment freedoms for WORLD and author of its weekly newsletter, Liberties. A graduate of World Journalism Institute's mid-career course, he worked for 34 years as a federal prosecutor in Raleigh, N.C., where he resides with his wife.
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