Comments | jenthompson: church and state

jenthompson

church and state

Oct 23, 2015 14:52

I just found out that my high school offers a new "bible literacy" class as an English elective this year. My mind is blown. I had no idea that such a thing existed in public schools, but apparently Texas passed a law allowing it in 2009 ( Read more... )

Comments 23

howlgirl October 23 2015, 20:58:05 UTC

There was a Bible as Lit class offered during high school in my relatively liberal home town. I think it all depends on the teacher.

ashariel October 23 2015, 21:24:33 UTC

Ugh. That presses every single one of my NOPE buttons.

ashamanja_babu October 23 2015, 21:57:48 UTC

THIS.

I took a world religion class in high school, and I loved it, but it covered many faiths, and was VERY heavy on Buddhism and eastern philosophy. A bible only class is a serious no to me.

padawansguide October 24 2015, 00:52:15 UTC

So much this.

blackcat452 October 23 2015, 21:25:11 UTC

I can understand studying the Bible as literature. You can't really understand European and American literature and art without understanding some of the stories. And some people don't know the significance of a serpent tempting you with an apple or the seven plagues of Egypt. But turning it into a bible study for Christian kids is taking it too far. It needs to be taught as stories, not history. That can be done objectively, so that it doesn't offend believers, but it doesn't seem to be the case here.

isabelladangelo October 23 2015, 21:28:14 UTC

Would it bug you if it was a Quran class taught by a devout Muslim with a class full of Muslim kids?

Although everyone remembers the "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" part, far too many seem to forget the "or prohibiting the free exercise therefore of". As long as there is no one saying that another religion cannot also have a class on their religious texts, it's well within the Constitution. Also, as a book, the Bible itself was hugely important to most of Western civilization.

jenthompson October 23 2015, 21:39:08 UTC

Yes - absolutely. It would bother me for ANY class that was based on *one* religion to be taught in a public school. And since you mentioned it, Texas only has this law in place to create a bible-based class - not one for the quran (or any other religion for that matter), so they are picking one religion and discriminating against the other. So yeah, that's a big deal to me.

And like I said, I agree with the fact that these stories are important, but I think they need to balanced with other religious viewpoints if they are going to be in a state school and paid for by my tax dollars.

isabelladangelo October 24 2015, 15:18:31 UTC

Okay, thank you for clarifying your position and explaining about the Texas law. I can understand having an indepth class on just the Old Testament for a semester - there is a lot in there and, although it would probably be more college level, you could have a really awesome Biblical Archeology type class. You could also cross reference the sayings in the New Testament with those in the Old Testament to understand the culture of the New Testament better. A third option, in my opinion, would be to cross reference the Catholic Bible versus the Protestant versus just the Torah and go through the history of each came to be as well as how each of the different religions interpret the various passages.

However, yeah, even I'd like at the least the option on the table for a Quran class or one on the Analects of Confucius. These books are too important to world history to just have a class on one very important book and not have the options for others.

twe October 24 2015, 00:47:19 UTC

Context does matter. It's not the same when it's the religion of the privileged majority, because it tends to reinforce the power structures and inequalities, particularly if it is being touted as an English class, when it's actually a religion class.

I do agree that the bible is important to much of Western Culture, though omitting study of the New Testament loses key parts of that.

Thread 6

geminiwench October 23 2015, 22:07:19 UTC

Up in Washington State, we're pretty liberal folk... (legalized recreational marijuana... early adopter of gay marriage... etc)... but at my public high school there was a credited Mormon seminary class. I thought that was a pretty silly thing for a public school to have, especially since there were no other religious classes offered except, like the one you took, a world religions class ( ... )