Steed Lobotzke, a Football coach for the United States Air Force Academy and alumni used his personal Twitter account to post Bible verses. This angered an activist group, labeling the tweets as “unchecked Christian extremism” and demanded that the Academy put an end to it. Learn how the Academy decided to respond at Firstliberty.org/Briefing.
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Football Coach Attacked by Activists for Personal Religious Tweets
Steed Lobotzke graduated from the United States Air Force Academy in 1992. He eventually found his way back to campus, this time as the tight-ends coach for the Academy’s football team. And, like the other coaches, he has a Twitter account where he describes himself as a “Follower of Christ, family man, and football coach.”
Perhaps like many of you, Coach Lobotzke often posts verses from the Bible on his Twitter account.
This angered an activist group, labeling the tweets as “unchecked Christian extremism” and demanded that the Academy put an end to it.
The Academy looked into it and determined that, in fact, the Twitter account was a personal account, not connected with the Academy, rightly concluding that it was “committed to protecting [an] individuals’ right to practice any religion they choose, or no religion, provided their practices do not violate policy or law, or impede mission accomplishment, military readiness, unit cohesion, standards or discipline.”
The activist’s response was vulgar and promised more antagonism against the institution, but the Academy made the right call. Had the Academy punished the coach for his personal tweets, they would’ve been hostile toward religion, rather than neutral, as the First Amendment demands.
Our Airmen may give up a lot to serve our country, but they do not give up religious liberty—in their planes, on the gridiron, or on Twitter.
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