"Bring me my chariot of fire,"
In Texas, the Sabbath Trumps the Semifinals
The Robert M. Beren Academy, an Orthodox Jewish day school in Houston, won its regional championship to advance to the boys basketball state semifinals this weekend in Dallas. But the team will not make the trip.
Michael Stravato for The New York Times
Beren Academy's basketball team had hoped to travel to Dallas early and play its semifinal game before sundown on Friday.
The Beren Academy players observe the Sabbath and do not play from sundown on Fridays to sundown on Saturdays. Their semifinal game is scheduled for 9 p.m. Friday.
“The sacred mission will trump excellence in the secular world,” Rabbi Harry Sinoff, Beren’s head of school, said Monday in a telephone interview.
The school filed an appeal to change the time of the game with the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools, or Tapps, the group that organizes the tournament. On Monday morning, representatives of the school were notified that the association’s nine-member executive board had rejected the appeal.
“When Beren’s joined years ago, we advised them that the Sabbath would present them with a problem with the finals,” Edd Burleson, the director of the association, said. “In the past, Tapps has held firmly to their rules because if schedules are changed for these schools, it’s hard for other schools.
“If we solve one problem, we create another problem.”
Membership in the association is voluntary, Burleson said.
“If the schools are just going to arrange their own schedule, why do we even set a tournament?” Burleson said. “Over a period of time, our state tournament, which is a highlight of our association, deteriorates to nothing. That’s the whole point of having an organization.”
Conflicts between religious beliefs and scheduling are becoming more commonplace because of the nation’s changing demographics, said Sarah Barringer Gordon, a professor of law and history at the University of Pennsylvania.
“Some associations are rethinking who their constituencies are,” Gordon said. “As pluralism works its way through American sports, we’re going to see more and more situations like this one.”
Several of Beren Academy’s opponents this season agreed to change the time of their games to avoid conflicts with the Sabbath, the school’s boys basketball coach, Chris Cole, said.
Cole, the team’s coach for 10 years, said many of the players on this season’s team, which is 23-5, had been playing together since grade school.
“We have a pretty mature group of guys,” Cole said. “They knew this could happen down the road.”
Beren Academy has an enrollment of 274, with students from 18 months to 18 years old. The upper-level school has 71 students.
This would have been Beren Academy’s first trip to the state semifinals. (The tournament is separate from the larger one run by the University Interscholastic League for the state’s public schools.) Zachary Yoshor, a 16-year-old junior on the basketball team, said this season’s success was a result of the players’ working together for so long.
“Our record has never been this good,” Yoshor said. “We’ve been able to win against teams that we’ve never beaten before. I’m appreciative that we’ve been able to play this far.”
The appeal request proposed that the team drive from Houston to Dallas on Thursday night, spend the night and play the semifinal game earlier on Friday, school officials said. Beren Academy’s opponent would have been Covenant School, from Dallas. Our Lady of the Hills, the team from Kerrville that Beren Academy defeated in the regional final, will replace Beren Academy in the state semifinal game.
“There isn’t any more for us to do,” Sinoff said. “We want to be in this year, but if not this year, next year.”
Mark Buchine, whose 17-year-old son, Isaac, plays for Beren Academy, said he still planned to head to Dallas with hopes of a resolution that would allow him to see his son play this weekend.
“It’s disappointing,” Buchine said. “I think the kids will be disappointed, too, but the team has this attitude of when there are bad calls, you just move on.” source:
Basketball -- never on (Christian) Sabbath
Israel news photo: Flash 90
Texas Schools Tell Jews Play on Sabbath or Forfeit
Freedom of religion in Texas – for Christians: No school basketball games on Sunday but Saturday game goes on despite Jewish protest.
Freedom of religion in Texas – for Christians: No school basketball games on Sunday but Saturday game goes on despite Jewish protest.
Texas schools do not allow sports competition on the Sunday, the Christian Sabbath, but they have ruled against a Jewish school scheduled to play a semi-finals championship game in Dallas on the Jewish Sabbath.
Houston’s orthodox Beren Academy chose to forfeit the game instead of violating the Jewish Sabbath by playing what was supposed to be its first-ever game in the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools (TAPPS) state tournament.
Beren asked TAPPS to reschedule the game from Friday night, after the Jewish Sabbath begins, and allow it to play earlier in the day, but officials ruled angst theschool.
The league is made up of mostly religious institutions, noted an opinion writer in theBeaumont (Texas) Enterprise. The writer commented, “Unfortunately, religious freedom is a one-way street here in Texas.
Beren previously was able to reschedule two of its playoff games, to Saturday night, after the Jewish Sabbath ends, and to noon Friday, before it begins, but its appeal to change the starting time of the semi-finals was rejected.
TAPPS does not allow sports to be played on Sundays, the day Christians traditionally go to church.
For Jews, the Sabbath is different. “Orthodox Jews take Saturday off, observing the Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. And by “taking off,” they do nothing. No electricity, no opening, no closing, no nothing,” noted the Enterprise.
“The sacred mission will trump excellence in the secular world,” Rabbi Harry Sinoff, Beren’s head of school, told The New York Times Monday.
TAPPS argued that it told Beren officials years ago that their joining the organized games could make it problematic for them to play on the Jewish Sabbath. source:
Orthodox Jewish High School Team Forfeits Playoff Game Instead Of Playing On Sabbath
I’ve heard of a lot reasons for a forfeit, but I’ve never heard of a religious reason derailing a state playoff basketball team. Beren Academy, which is an Orthodox Jewish high school, has decided to forfeit instead of playing its state semifinal game because it falls on the Sabbath.
The school is coming off its best season in history and attempts to get the game time changed have failed so far.
Personally, I think the state should bend the rules here. Change the game time. These kids shouldn’t be punished because of their religion. They just had an amazing season and it’s now over because you won’t change.
If you support Beren Academy, sign this petition to get the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools (TAPPS) to change their mind.
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