Another verse coming in ‘Ave Maria’ lawsuit

Even though a judge has ruled the Everett School District was on solid ground when it banned from a high school graduation an instrumental song it deemed religious, a former student isn’t giving up her legal fight.

Kathryn Nurre, a 2006 Henry M. Jackson High School graduate, contends the district violated her free speech and religious rights and plans to appeal the recent ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Robert Lasnik.

Graduating seniors in the school’s wind ensemble had selected for commencement an instrumental version of Franz Biebl’s “Ave Maria,” which derives its name from a Catholic prayer and translates to “Hail Mary” in Latin.

District administrators balked, saying that musical selections for graduation should be “entirely secular.”

Lasnik sided with the school district. Nurre’s supporters say it’s a case of political correctness run amok.

“It’s ridiculous,” said John Whitehead, president and founder of the Virginia-based Rutherford Institute, a conservative legal organization that specializes in religious rights cases and represented Nurre.

Students had played “Ave Maria” during a winter concert without dispute, but district leaders drew a distinction between a concert and commencement.

School district officials had little to say about Lasnik’s ruling.

“We believe that it will be affirmed again if the Rutherford Institute in Virginia plans to support an appeal,” said Mary Waggoner, a school district spokeswoman. “We will allow the legal processes to continue without comment through the time remaining for them to consider filing an appeal and through any further action that might ensue.”

Nurre, now a 19-year-old college student interested in a law career, said she hopes the case reaches the U.S. Supreme Court.

“It is true all of us just picked the piece because we liked how it sounded,” she said. “We had pretty much mastered it. It was just a piece of music.”

Eric Stevick writes for the Herald in Everett.