DALLAS — A federal judge ruled Wednesday to temporarily block a new Texas law requiring school districts to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms.

The judge agreed with a group of multifaith and nonreligious families that the law will interfere with their children’s religious education and send a harmful message.

In a statement, Attorney General Ken Paxton said he will “absolutely be appealing this flawed decision.”

“The Ten Commandments are a cornerstone of our moral and legal heritage, and their presence in classrooms serves as a reminder of the values that guide responsible citizenship,” he said. “Texas will always defend our right to uphold the foundational principles that have built this nation.”

U.S. District Judge Fred Biery, in his ruling, found the law “officially favors Christian dominations over others” and “crosses the line from exposure to coercion.” Classroom displays of the Ten Commandments “are likely to send an exclusionary and spiritually burdensome message” to the plaintiff families’ children that they are “the other,” he wrote.

“The displays are likely to pressure the child-Plaintiffs into religious observance, meditation on, veneration, and adoption of the State’s favored religious scripture, and into suppressing expression of their own religious or nonreligious backgrounds and beliefs while at school,” Biery wrote.

The 11 school districts named in the suit, including Plano ISD, Austin ISD and Houston ISD, are temporarily prohibited from displaying the Ten Commandments, according to the ruling. Dallas ISD is not named in this lawsuit.

“As a rabbi and public school parent, I welcome this ruling,” said Mara Nathan, a plaintiff in the lawsuit. “Children’s religious beliefs should be instilled by parents and faith communities, not politicians and public schools.”

The law is set to take effect on Sept. 1.

The 16 families that are part of the federal lawsuit are Jewish, Christian, Unitarian Universalist, Hindu or nonreligious. They argued SB 10 “forcibly” subjects students to state-sponsored scriptural principles such as “I AM the LORD thy God” and “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”

The families say the law is a violation of the First Amendment’s establishment and free exercise clauses, which protect the separation of church and state and religious freedom, respectively, according to court rulings.

Republican state lawmakers have said young people need God and suggested only good could come from exposure to a document that encourages students to respect their parents and not kill, steal or cheat.

They have also said Christianity is an important part of the nation’s founding and history, noting that references to God are on U.S. currency as well as in the national and Texas pledges.

“Very few documents in the history of Western civilization and even more so in American history have had a larger impact on our moral code and our legal code and just our culture than the Ten Commandments,” Sen. Phil King, R-Weatherford, said during floor debate in March.

The families who filed the lawsuit are represented by the civil liberties organizations Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the national ACLU, the ACLU of Texas and the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

A Dallas activist group and faith leaders filed a similar lawsuit in June seeking to block Dallas ISD and Lancaster ISD from displaying the Ten Commandments.

Gov. Greg Abbott signed SB 10 into law in June and said it would likely be challenged in court.

“Bring it,” Abbott wrote in a social media post in May, when civil rights groups threatened to sue after lawmakers passed the measure.

If left in place, Texas public schools must conspicuously display a durable poster or framed copy of the Ten Commandments that is at least 16 inches by 20 inches. The law specifies the exact wording that must be used and requires the text size and typeface be readable for a person with average vision from anywhere in the classroom.

The lawsuit cites a 1980 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck Kentucky’s Ten Commandments law for being unconstitutional, as well as more recent civil action. A federal court in Louisiana last year blocked that state’s Ten Commandments law for violating the establishment and free exercise clauses, a ruling that was affirmed on appeal last month.

Supporters of the Ten Commandments law have said the 1980 case in Kentucky was wrongly decided and should be overturned. They also said a 2022 Supreme Court decision acknowledged a new history and tradition standard to assess potential violations of the establishment clause.

Opponents said the law is a clear violation of the Constitution.