Letter to the Tennessean
I sent the following letter to the author of the first article that I posted from the Tennessean:
Anita,
I left a phone message with you last night and I wanted to provide you with more information regarding the situation at my son’s school.
Last week Gideon’s International was permitted to enter the fifth grade classes at Castle Heights Upper Elementary and provide bibles to the students. They interrupted my son’s class time and told the class who they were and brought with them a box of new testament bibles. The students were told that if they wanted to they could come get a bible from the box. I have no objection to the bible or to Christianity, I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 bibles at my home as well as a Koran, a book of mormon, and many other religious texts and books on religions. I have a passion for the academia of religion. However, I send my son to a public school and not to a religious one and I expect that religious texts will not be distributed in school. I expect my son to read and learn about all religions at some point in his life but not at the age of ten when he is really too young to understand the complexities of belief, faith, and politics as they are presented in religious organizations. It seems to me that by allowing bibles to be distributed at schools it sends a message to the students that they should be Christian and believe in the precepts set forth in the bible. And while I realize the schools do not vocalize these statements, to a ten year old there is little difference.
According to section 10 of "Religion in the Public Schools: A joint statement of current law" (http://www.ed.gov/Speeches/04-1995/prayer.html#6) which was written and endorsed by a variety of religious organizations as well as civil rights organizations, "Outsiders may not be given access to the classroom to distribute religious or anti-religious literature. No court has yet considered whether, if all other community groups are permitted to distribute literature in common areas of public schools, religious groups must be allowed to do so on equal terms subject to reasonable time, place and manner restrictions."
Armed with this knowledge I went to speak to the principal of the school, Terry Trice on Friday the 22nd of September. His frank response is that Wilson County schools had been allowing bibles to be distributed in this manner for 40 or 50 years and that the board had approved it. He also stated that he personally supported this action and would not change it unless the board instructed him to do otherwise. As such, I requested the names of the board members I should speak to. I was advised to speak with Dr. Sharon Roberts, director of schools of the Lebanon Special School District, or to the assistant director, Randall Hutto. The director was on vacation and Mr. Hutto and I spoke on the phone. I again explained my position: I am not against the bible or Christianity, however, no religious text has a place in a public school, especially where young children are in attendance. I explained that I am not opposed to a class teaching the academia of all religions in the form of religious awareness but that too was outside the letter of the law. I advised him that I wanted a public apology from the school and for the distribution of all religious texts to be eliminated from the Wilson County programs. He advised that he understood my perspective and would discuss my complaint with the director and with legal counsel. As of this morning he is waiting on a response from legal counsel, it was suggested that the wait would be one or two more weeks.
I would like very much to get in touch with the appropriate person at the ACLU regarding the suit you wrote about on the 28th. If possible, I would also like to know if I could help further this story in any way.
Anita,
I left a phone message with you last night and I wanted to provide you with more information regarding the situation at my son’s school.
Last week Gideon’s International was permitted to enter the fifth grade classes at Castle Heights Upper Elementary and provide bibles to the students. They interrupted my son’s class time and told the class who they were and brought with them a box of new testament bibles. The students were told that if they wanted to they could come get a bible from the box. I have no objection to the bible or to Christianity, I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 bibles at my home as well as a Koran, a book of mormon, and many other religious texts and books on religions. I have a passion for the academia of religion. However, I send my son to a public school and not to a religious one and I expect that religious texts will not be distributed in school. I expect my son to read and learn about all religions at some point in his life but not at the age of ten when he is really too young to understand the complexities of belief, faith, and politics as they are presented in religious organizations. It seems to me that by allowing bibles to be distributed at schools it sends a message to the students that they should be Christian and believe in the precepts set forth in the bible. And while I realize the schools do not vocalize these statements, to a ten year old there is little difference.
According to section 10 of "Religion in the Public Schools: A joint statement of current law" (http://www.ed.gov/Speeches/04-1995/prayer.html#6) which was written and endorsed by a variety of religious organizations as well as civil rights organizations, "Outsiders may not be given access to the classroom to distribute religious or anti-religious literature. No court has yet considered whether, if all other community groups are permitted to distribute literature in common areas of public schools, religious groups must be allowed to do so on equal terms subject to reasonable time, place and manner restrictions."
Armed with this knowledge I went to speak to the principal of the school, Terry Trice on Friday the 22nd of September. His frank response is that Wilson County schools had been allowing bibles to be distributed in this manner for 40 or 50 years and that the board had approved it. He also stated that he personally supported this action and would not change it unless the board instructed him to do otherwise. As such, I requested the names of the board members I should speak to. I was advised to speak with Dr. Sharon Roberts, director of schools of the Lebanon Special School District, or to the assistant director, Randall Hutto. The director was on vacation and Mr. Hutto and I spoke on the phone. I again explained my position: I am not against the bible or Christianity, however, no religious text has a place in a public school, especially where young children are in attendance. I explained that I am not opposed to a class teaching the academia of all religions in the form of religious awareness but that too was outside the letter of the law. I advised him that I wanted a public apology from the school and for the distribution of all religious texts to be eliminated from the Wilson County programs. He advised that he understood my perspective and would discuss my complaint with the director and with legal counsel. As of this morning he is waiting on a response from legal counsel, it was suggested that the wait would be one or two more weeks.
I would like very much to get in touch with the appropriate person at the ACLU regarding the suit you wrote about on the 28th. If possible, I would also like to know if I could help further this story in any way.