A high-school valedictorian from South Carolina ripped his pre-approved speech during graduation and instead recited the Lord’s Prayer, reports Yahoo! News.

He was in protest of the school district’s policy of banning prayer from its events and premises.

Roy Costner IV, the top graduate of Pickens County, South Carolina’s Liberty High School, said after telling the crowd his speech has been approved, “Obviously, I didn’t do my job well enough.”

“We’re going to have to use a different one. Who cares?” Costner said before ripping his speech in two.

“Those that we look up to, they have helped carve and mold us into the young adults that we are today,” Costner said, restarting his speech. ‘I’m so glad that both of my parents led me to the Lord at a young age. And I think most of you will understand when I say…’

He paused before reciting the invocation that most of the audience had heard before.

“Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name…”

His approved address had started to sound like the Lord's prayer, and moment’s later it was evident that the Valedictorian’s speech has become an invocation of the prayer.

He continued, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

The applause built up as he continued to pray. At one point, “You couldn’t even hear him doing the prayer anymore,” Brian Hoover, who attended the ceremony, told TV station KSBW.

Hoover said, “Everybody was clapping and cheering.”

Costner pressed on to finish the prayer, pointing a finger in the air as he struggled to be heard over the crowd.

"For Thine is the Kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever…Amen."

The teenager’s zeal, according to MailOnline, may have been a result of the school district’s most recent ruling to ban prayers that references a specific religion in public gatherings, such as school board meetings and graduations.

The rule has caused a stir in the southern state, as it was perceived as a “ban on prayer in schools.”

The school district’s superintendent, Kelly Pew clarified the rule in a blog post last March:

"What I find unfortunate are the mistaken and false representations that the Board or the District want to ‘ban’ prayer from our schools,’ she writes. ‘The difference between the Board taking unto itself an invocation that previously was given by invitation, and some sort of wholesale anti-religious campaign, is vast."

Despite seemingly violating the county’s new ruling on prayer, the valedictorian won’t be facing any disciplinary action.

According to school publication WYFF, Costner will be pursuing a bachelors degree at nearby Clemson University in the fall and hopes to become a computer programmer.