Rick Santorum: Let’s call secularism a religion so it can be banned from the classroom

[glendab]

Hello DG.

“Secularist” education doesn’t have a precept that “there is no God”.
It has a precept that there are many different beliefs–which there are, and that includes Atheism and Agosticism…and that there are many different religions–which there are…and that a school should not teach just one of them.
And a school does not have time to teach each and every one of them…so it will leave the teaching of religion and belief to the parents.

Why is that so wrong?
As a Catholic parent, do you want your child to be taught that Jesus did not fulfill the Messiah qualities, as per what Jewish followers believe…and/or that Jesus is not divine, as per what Muslims believe…etc?

That would be the proper way to do it.
If you don’t mind that, then we an all push for all children can have a class in school where all the religions–including the belief that there is no God and why–are taught.
And it’s covered.
That would, indeed, be just.
But I have a feeling you would not be so happy about that…?

.

I received a public school education. We had a few Catholic kids in our classes whose families were too poor to be able to afford the tuition at the local Parish school so they came our way. Some also were there because mom and dad divorced or because mom and dad “didn’t want anymore babies” so they couldn’t go to Church and the kids got taken out of Catholic school because of that fact. They were very open about their reasons for being among us pagans! It was kinda silly and it wasn’t until I grew up and became a Catholic that I realized the ramifications of this. To me, they were just kids like me so we played together. It was elementary school days for me when I saw girls out on the playground who naturally gathered together during recess after lunch to pray their Rosary together and they got away with it for a few weeks, but then they got stopped and their Rosaries confiscated by the teachers and guess what? Those same Rosaries were held in the Principle’s Office until just before dismissal and they were told to NOT even bring them to school anymore because they were NOT ALLOWED to have them on school property. They were specifically told to leave their Rosaries at home and there was much talk about this for a few weeks and several children were removed from our school over it, some parents fearing for their children found a way to get them out of this environment, not the school asking them to leave. They couldn’t do that. But in all the talk, it got around to us kids that the Assistant Principle was an Atheist and he became vociferous about that. His voice actually carried down the hallways as he really needed no bullhorn. He was a loud person by nature. He was our disciplinarian and he didn’t want any Rosaries in his school! That was that. Us kids called this dictatorship as a joke and made fun of him.

At this same public school when you got up there in grades, 6, 7, 8, you got “social studies” classes and they would tell you the main religion of the lands you were studying, and in a few sentences tell you what each believed. And that was pretty much it. Covered. Done and over with. But if you raised you hand and tried, and a few of the Catholic kids did actually try, to engage the teacher in discussion of other religions you got basically silenced or labeled trouble makers. Seems the administration there was actually upset at having to educate Catholic kids and generally felt the need to keep them in line. They didn’t do much of anything but they were seen as a threat simply by being there.

That IS the educational environment I grew up in. It was a nice little prospering suburban town on the verge of great economic growth which happened in that generation. Everyone got rich. It was expected. but we did get the message at school: keep your religion to yourself and off school property. That isn’t the American way. Really. That is a corruption of the American way: it projects a freedom FROM religion for those who don’t want any anywhere they go, and not a freedom OF religion for those who do and have one and wish to practice it, which ever one they have. It is a demonstration of an ideology that says atheism must be the norm.

Glenda

 

[glendab]

Hello Meltzerboy.

OK, Glenda, this is another, albeit related matter. I think it’s a question, from the secularist viewpoint, of whether the children who practice their religion in school are behaving so blatantly that they are in effect endorsing a particular religion and thereby having an unwanted influence on other children who cannot help but observe them. It’s a tricky issue. My feeling is they should be allowed to practice their faith in public schools within certain confines of behavior, and that lawsuits which infringe upon this in all instances are often frivolous. But I can understand the occasionally legitimate concerns of the opposing side.

Is wearing a Kippa frivolous and if you chose to do so for the required four cubits walking distance, would you want to be harassed for it? Suppose your son, enrolled in public school and preparing for bar mitzvah makes the decision that he’d like to remain under the divine presence and wear his wherever he goes, but when he does this he is sent home from school and told he cannot because it promotes religion and the state public school cannot be seen as endorsing any one religion. I bet my money that if he did this, chances are that is exactly how it would play out. Kippa left in pocket and placed on head when OFF SCHOOL PROPERTY! Dare ya to get your synagogue to prove it! How many young men are there there?

Glenda

P.S. My father’s was embroidered by my grandmother’s own hand.

 

[meltzerboy]

Hello Meltzerboy.

Is wearing a Kippa frivolous and if you chose to do so for the required four cubits walking distance, would you want to be harassed for it? Suppose your son, enrolled in public school and preparing for bar mitzvah makes the decision that he’d like to remain under the divine presence and wear his wherever he goes, but when he does this he is sent home from school and told he cannot because it promotes religion and the state public school cannot be seen as endorsing any one religion. I bet my money that if he did this, chances are that is exactly how it would play out. Kippa left in pocket and placed on head when OFF SCHOOL PROPERTY! Dare ya to get your synagogue to prove it! How many young men are there there?

Glenda

P.S. My father’s was embroidered by my grandmother’s own hand.

Glenda, please re-read what I said, which was that many of the lawsuits against religious practices in public schools are frivolous. Maybe I didn’t state this clearly. At the same time, however, some behavior may be too much for other students who do not share the same beliefs. That’s why it’s not clear-cut in all cases; but, in general, I support people’s rights to practice their religion in the public square, including school. I do not support public schools that wish to instill religious beliefs in students.

 

[Contra_Mundum_1]

I support people’s rights to practice their religion in the public square, including school. I do not support public schools that wish to instill religious beliefs in students.

If I am not mistaken, most people here would agree with this.

But is the secularist movement (I believe it is a movement) OK with this, or do they want to erase religion from the public square completely? Because this has been my impression. Most non-religious people simply don’t like religion and want nothing to have with it and in a number of countries now they have the power to get their own way. I think it is as simple as that.

 

[estesbob]

Glenda, please re-read what I said, which was that many of the lawsuits against religious practices in public schools are frivolous. Maybe I didn’t state this clearly. At the same time, however, some behavior may be too much for other students who do not share the same beliefs. That’s why it’s not clear-cut in all cases; but, in general, I support people’s rights to practice their religion in the public square, including school. I do not support public schools that wish to instill religious beliefs in students.

And I don’t support public schools. The way things are now the middle class and the rich can afford to get their children the education of their choice. The poor are stuck in increasingly dysfunctional and amoral schools were religion is seen as an enemy .

America’s public school system is set up to benefit the teachers , not the children.

 

[meltzerboy]

And I don’t support public schools. The way things are now the middle class and the rich can afford to get their children the education of their choice. The poor are stuck in increasingly dysfunctional and amoral schools were religion is seen as an enemy .

America’s public school system is set up to benefit the teachers , not the children.

I don’t accept the blanket premise that public schools see religion as the enemy. Even if this is so, however, what makes you think that secular private schools (not religious private schools) are any better in that regard? Further, not all middle class parents can afford to send their children to private schools either; it’s not only the poor that cannot afford to do so. Private schools can be very expensive. Finally, if American public schools were set up to benefit the teachers, they would be more like private schools: smaller class enrollment, more qualified students with respect to academic performance, fewer behavior problems among students, higher pay and better working environment for teachers: for example, the physical condition of buildings, resources such as computers, and so on.

 

[mikekle]

I disagree. I watched the removal of God not just from the classroom but from many public places. The ACLU was allowing us to practice our religion by their rules. They sued cities for having a Nativity in front of their City Hall, and removed “religious monuments” from public places. These things were crimes? They put themselves there by themselves? I watched a video of a priest laying prostrate across the stone steps of a building as a stone carving of the Bible was taken out. This is a crime? In a nearby community, shopkeepers would play Christmas music from speakers attached to the outside of their stores. Then the City Council heard a complaint and passed an ordinance that said you could play the music but without the words. Imagine “Silent Night” without the words.

In one of the news weeklies, I saw a photo of a man carrying a sign that read: “America! Get off your knees!”

Peace,
Ed

Well, Jesus did warn us, in the end times, just practicing christianity would become a crime, and people would be imprisoned, tortured and killed for such things…we are getting pretty close to all of those, and it is happening already in some parts of the world…pretty scary if you ask me!!

Plus, it may be true all these schools and cites criminalize christianity, but they dont dare do the same with Islam, hinduism, or other religions…someone needs to remind these places, if they are going to condemn one religion,they must condemn them all…lets see what happens then!

 

[St_Francis]

Absence of religion?
No one is telling you not to teach your child religion.
Are you saying that if your child had no religion in their public school, then they would have no access at all to religion and deities?
You would not take your child to church every Sunday or pray before meals or have bible study classes, etc?
Are you depending on the classroom to be the place to teach your child about Catholicism?

Religions have many different “creation stories”.
Which one, exactly, are you wanting children to learn?

And, by the way, Religion and History classes are indeed available in many schools. And these classes do teach various creation stories if different religions and civilizations.

.

I think that we have not worded our problem sufficiently clearly. You may have noticed that we say the problem is that *something has been allowed in *as a result of the elimination of religion from the classroom.

I would say that the problem is not so much that we want religion per se to be explicitly taught, but that we do not want that particular *something else *to be taught in its stead.

For example, in the 1940s and 1950s, students might encounter a sex ed class. In accordance with the law and the desires of the parents, this would be simple biology, with in some situations, some discussion of birth control. But underlying the discussion as a whole would be the assumption that this activity was reserved for marriage.

This changed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the idea of pre-marital sex as a viable and perhaps preferable option was brought into textbooks and schools. Teaching sensitive subjects such as sex and drug use was through the “non-directive” method pioneered by Carl Rogers.

In history, those whom had previously been lauded for their achievements were denigrated to selfish power-hungry money-grubbers as they were retroactively psycho-analysed under the new standards.

In literature, the human issues were equally reduced to economics and oppression.

In science, the most modern ideas were promoted and old-fasioned ideas repressed.

---

The problem is that the two events took place concurrently. Religion was removed in the early 60s, and this other thing came in during the 60s and early 70s. I do not know if it would be possible to have a non-religious system which retained the “goodness” of the religious system, but what we have is not simply the absence of religion but the insertion of a set of “values” not based on anything except people’s fantasies and desires.

 

[abucs]

I

“Secularist” education doesn’t have a precept that “there is no God”.
.

Educational systems impart a fully comprehensive set of knowledge, skills and ethics to students. Banning God from consideration forces the creating and accepting of precepts that are non ’God’. When you enforce people to live in a culture of non God, you are challenging and undermining the God culture. So it is a flawed system with regards to neutrality.

Take authority for example. The Christian says authority comes from the creator. Even the American declaration of independence says that our rights come from the creator. The secular school says ‘no God’ in education. In repressive atheist countries the schools teach authority and rights rest in the government. In western countries schools teach authority comes from democracy, the United Nations or else there is no ultimate form of authority and encourages students that any authority they meet is unjust and should be challenged. We’ve seen a couple of generations now of this individualistic rebellion that has come straight from our education system abandoning Christian precepts of authority and adopting precepts that involve ‘no God’.

Take history for example. The Christian teaches that Creation has a purpose for man to be redeemed and made holy through community and seeking God. Secular education cannot do this. It teaches there is no ultimate reality beyond what we make for ourselves.

Language is enculturated such as ‘constructing reality’ instead of ‘understanding reality; , ‘creating a purpose’ ‘rather than finding it’; accepting ‘all views are equal’ instead of measuring it against ‘the yardstick of the Creator’ teaching we are ‘accidental directionless by-products of natural forces ruled by natural law’ instead of ‘purposefully created spiritual beings with free-will, obligations and responsibilities’.

Such language, behaviour and formation enculturates students in a way which challenges the idea of God. Once you rule out any consideration of God you have to accept precepts and concepts which negate the idea of God.

The changing culture of the last generations caused by the mistake of secular education is testament to this.

It has a precept that there are many different beliefs–which there are, and that includes Atheism and Agosticism…and that there are many different religions–which there are…and that a school should not teach just one of them.

And a school does not have time to teach each and every one of them…so it will leave the teaching of religion and belief to the parents.

.

No it makes the students live in a culture where the precepts are ‘without God’. It challenges the culture of parents and forces students to choose between cultures.

Schools inform students and is the most important lived culture for students at the time (along with secular media) Students often choose this culture of ‘no God’. That is, they are converted to ‘no God’ because of the biases of secular education. We’ve seen it happen. There is no argument that this does not happen.

This is why most children who rebel from Christianity do it under the false belief that it is not intellectually sound. They get this idea from school, which is supposed to be intellectually sound. The place that the children go to be intellectually developed promulgates precepts where there is no God. It teaches that all faiths should be considered equal which then leads inevitably to the belief all religion is constructed by man and none come from a God.

Why is that so wrong?

.

Because it is indoctrinating other peoples kids to your own philosophy whilst claiming a monopoly of public taxes to do so. In short. It is authoritarian repression.

 

[abucs]

As a Catholic parent, do you want your child to be taught that Jesus did not fulfill the Messiah qualities, as per what Jewish followers believe…and/or that Jesus is not divine, as per what Muslims believe…etc?

.

If the Jewish people were to come to Christian cultured countries and demand that the government here only pay for children’s education where the precepts are Jewish then this would be unjust and I would object. I would have less objections if I went to Israel. But the Jewish people are not seeking to force this type of injustice on me. You are.

If you don’t mind that, then we can all push for all children to have a class in school where all the religions–including the belief that there is no God and why–are taught.
And it’s covered.
That would, indeed, be just.
But I have a feeling you would not be so happy about that…?

.

Your comment very heavily betrays the culture and view that there is no God. This is exactly what is wrong with the secular model and the enforced biases it starts with.

Christianity is not just a set of assertions. It is a lived culture where you come into contact with the Divine. You cannot have a lived culture with Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism and Atheism all at the same time. That is to mis-understand, mis-categorise and dismiss the spiritual realities.

Your statement also betrays the secular morality of what I call mis-directed equality. It treats all views and cultures the same without regard to the predominant underlying culture or reason. This is a nonsense that only makes sense if you are enculturated with secular concepts.

It puts all concepts of God in the one bucket called religion, views them all as man-made assertions and forces us to treat each the same. It would be like teaching sport without ever partaking in it. It would be like equating football and hurling and forcing equal treatment for both.

If the Chinese government came out and said we are going to be ‘equal’ with regards to language, art, architecture and food so that in its communications, sponsoring of art, building approvals and food imports it only supported as much Chinese as say Danish, Peruvian, Angolan etc ; apart from being a complete mess this ‘equality’ would be a direct attack on the underlying Chinese culture.

Likewise the secular model of education and ‘enforced’ equality is an attack on the underlying Christian faith and culture of the west and it has caused a cultural mess.

You are the aggressor and you are the authoritarian. Banning God from public education is in no way neutral and it is in no way just.

 

[Mark121359]

They are imposing their non belief in God on others and call it neutrality.

This is incorrect.
This is not what “secularists” want.

Aargh.
“Secularists” don’t necessarily NOT believe in God.
They believe that religious institutions and government institutions should be separate, that is all. That is what a “secularist” is…

It’s a bit more than you describe. From Merriam-Webster;

***sec·u·lar·ism noun \ˈse-kyə-lə-ˌri-zəm\
: the belief that religion should not play a role in government, education, or other public parts of society. *** Indifference to or rejection or exclusion of religion and religious considerations.

The above definition; the belief that religion should not play a role in government, education, or other public parts of society, and words such as rejection and exclusion are a far cry from just simple separation. And besides the classroom, you’re seeing this played out more and more in society in general. The baker who’s sued, because he refuses a gay couple based on his religious convictions. Or the Catholic innkeepers sued for refusing to host a gay wedding. In Canada for instance, Fr. Alphonse de Valk, a founder of Canada’s pro-life movement who had to fight a human rights complaint because he dared to uphold the teachings of the Bible and the Catechism of the Catholic Church during Canada’s controversial debate over same-sex marriage. Homosexual activists there strived to silence the 76-year-old Basilian priest from the pulpit. Worse still, Father was forced to pay $20,000 in legal expenses to defend himself, while the costs incurred by the government in its persecution of him were picked up by the taxpayer. And then there’s Bob Eschliman. Mr. Eschliman is an award-winning journalist. He also happens to be a man of faith. Bob wrote in defense of his faith’s teaching about marriage on his own personal, private blog. Suddenly, he found himself suspended, and then terminated, from his position as editor-in-chief of the Newton Daily News. And their are many, many more stories just like this.

The fact of the matter is, is that it’s disingenuous to simply imply that secularists are "content" on only keeping religious institutions and government institutions separate. The way it appears to me in 2014, secularists are doing everything in their power to squash religion…period! There’s a certain hostility that’s very, very apparent to me that secularists have today towards religion, especially Christianity! If you pursue or follow your religion and express it in public, at your profession etc., this certainly will not be tolerated. If you are Christian, you are to “worship” on Sunday only, and then keep your religious beliefs to yourself the rest of the week. Of course these are only my opinions, but this is the way I’m reading secularism today.

Peace, Mark

 

[SuperLuigi]

why it’s not clear-cut in all cases; but, in general, I support people’s rights to practice their religion in the public square, including school. I do not support public schools that wish to instill religious beliefs in students.

I don’t think I’d want “unionized public servants” teaching our kids about religion, either. Especially since a lot of parents would perhaps feel the need to relax such instruction themselves if it’s being taught in schools.

 

[signit]

For me it isn’t so much about what they teach but what they will allow practiced in the school by the children during school hours. Children were stopped from praying grace before their meals in a lunchroom. Kids got suspended for wearing T-shirts with Crucifixes on them. Religious jewelry that some girls wore was forced to be removed. They were forbidden to pray together during free period. They aren’t allowed to even bring a Bible to school, but by some twist of legalities they do provide them in the school’s library, just no reading it aloud.

Glenda

It was elementary school days for me when I saw girls out on the playground who naturally gathered together during recess after lunch to pray their Rosary together and they got away with it for a few weeks, but then they got stopped and their Rosaries confiscated by the teachers and guess what? Those same Rosaries were held in the Principle’s Office until just before dismissal and they were told to NOT even bring them to school anymore because they were NOT ALLOWED to have them on school property. They were specifically told to leave their Rosaries at home and there was much talk about this for a few weeks and several children were removed from our school over it, some parents fearing for their children found a way to get them out of this environment, not the school asking them to leave. They couldn’t do that. But in all the talk, it got around to us kids that the Assistant Principle was an Atheist and he became vociferous about that. His voice actually carried down the hallways as he really needed no bullhorn. He was a loud person by nature. He was our disciplinarian and he didn’t want any Rosaries in his school! That was that. Us kids called this dictatorship as a joke and made fun of him.

Glenda

My impression is that that’s not the law.

Students in public schools do have the right to say their own Christian prayers or read the Christian Bible on their own time, or form a Catholic club/Rosary club/pro-life club which is student-directed.

They just can’t have the school or school officials sponsoring religion.

We’ve posted before about the Equal Access Act for public secondary schools; if they let one student-led group into the school, they have to allow them all, even a religious group.

 

[estesbob]

I don’t accept the blanket premise that public schools see religion as the enemy. Even if this is so, however, what makes you think that secular private schools (not religious private schools) are any better in that regard? Further, not all middle class parents can afford to send their children to private schools either; it’s not only the poor that cannot afford to do so. Private schools can be very expensive. Finally, if American public schools were set up to benefit the teachers, they would be more like private schools: smaller class enrollment, more qualified students with respect to academic performance, fewer behavior problems among students, higher pay and better working environment for teachers: for example, the physical condition of buildings, resources such as computers, and so on.

If a parent feels that a private sector school is not meeting their children’s education needs they could move them to another school The current set up has children at the mercy of the NEA and secular humanists.

 

[Darryl1958]

If I am not mistaken, most people here would agree with this.

But is the secularist movement (I believe it is a movement) OK with this, or do they want to erase religion from the public square completely? Because this has been my impression. Most non-religious people simply don’t like religion and want nothing to have with it and in a number of countries now they have the power to get their own way. I think it is as simple as that.

It is not just that ‘militant’ secularism seeks to erase any thing conceivably Christian from the public square, but that they want to instill values of their own choosing into the public square and public schools. Tolerance of say sexual diversity is not militant. However, advocacy of any manner of sexual relationships as equally valid and equally valued is in effect introducing a new non-Christian creed into the public square as the official one.

 

[Darryl1958]

It is inevitable of course that any school will have to teach values. A value-free education is for the most part valueless. In a society where separation of church and state is effectively written into the constitution and the fabric of the law, there is good reason for government to withdraw from the education system and defer to private institutions which reflect the values of the communities that they draw students from.

 

[meltzerboy]

If a parent feels that a private sector school is not meeting their children’s education needs they could move them to another school The current set up has children at the mercy of the NEA and secular humanists.

You say “at the mercy of the NEA” as if this is equivalent to at the mercy of the KKK! Also realize the children are at least at the mercy of teachers who must be certified educators, unlike private school teachers, and public school administrators who cannot hire or fire teachers according to their own whims, unlike private school administrators. (I am speaking in general since some private schools also require certified teachers and are egalitarian in their hiring and firing practices.) These are some of the POSITIVE benefits of unions for both public school teachers and students.

 

[St_Francis]

You say “at the mercy of the NEA” as if this is equivalent to at the mercy of the KKK! Also realize the children are at least at the mercy of teachers who must be certified educators, unlike private school teachers, and public school administrators who cannot hire or fire teachers according to their own whims, unlike private school administrators. (I am speaking in general since some private schools also require certified teachers and are egalitarian in their hiring and firing practices.) These are some of the POSITIVE benefits of unions for both public school teachers and students.

One reason parents are suspicious of the NEA:

From their Resolutions:

(new): Adopted

C-25. COMPREHENSIVE SCHOOL HEALTH, SOCIAL, AND PSYCHOLOGICAL PROGRAMS AND SERVICES

Amend by deletion and addition on page 7, line 10, of the committee’s report:

The National Education Association believes that to promote health and wellbeing every child student, preK through higher education, should have direct and confidential access to comprehensive health, social, and psychological programs and services.

I-17. Family Planning The National Education Association supports family planning, including the right to reproductive freedom. The Association urges the government to give high priority to making available all methods of family planning to women and men unable to take advantage of private facilities. **The Association also urges the implementation of community-operated, school-based family planning clinics that will provide intensive counseling by trained personnel. **(1985, 1986).

A student can’t take some tylenol to school, but they’ll help him get treated for an STD, and her to get birth control and if needed, an abortion.

All without the parents’ knowledge.

 

[RGCheek]

He’s not being serious. His conversation represents irrational musings between two people whose viewpoints are on the periphery of society. This is NOT a news story.

says the man as he makes reference to the news story, lol

 

[RGCheek]

OK, Glenda, this is another, albeit related matter. I think it’s a question, from the secularist viewpoint, of whether the children who practice their religion in school are behaving so blatantly that they are in effect endorsing a particular religion and thereby having an unwanted influence on other children who cannot help but observe them.

Lol, no offense, but have you actually read the First Amendment?

It has something known as the ‘Free Exercise Clause’:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or **prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

Now what was it when one had an ‘establishment of religion’? You had what was common at that time, a central state, usually a monarchy then, that had the support and endorsement of a specific sect of Christianity, and it in turn was the official religion of that state.

So we had at the time of the American Revolution the Church of England which shared it supreme clerical office with that of the head of state of England. So the king of England was also the head of the Anglican Church. The taxes you paid to the British government also went to support the Anglican church, and many of our Founding Fathers considered that tyrannical, to take mans money from him and use it to support a religion he considered evil or at least morally maligned.

So secularists have argued that having the local state do things that ‘endorse’ religion is tantamount to moving toward a degree and kind of an establishment of religion, but isn’t that like saying a kiss is moving toward and degree of a kind of marriage?

Nonetheless, the Free Exercise Clause states that the government cannot limit the free expression of religion. Now who was being addressed? The individual officials and employees of the federal government, that is who.

Each state already had their own little state churches, or a good many of them anyway. In Virginia it was the Anglican church (rebranded as Episcopalians), in Mass. it was the Congregationalists, in PA it was the Quakers, in New York it was the Presbyterians, and so on. People feared that one states religion might one day dominate the federal government and all the states would have a renewed tyranny on their hands. So they put the establishment clause in to prevent that, and to guarantee that no employee of the federal government would ever have to take an oath of loyalty to some church he was not a member of.

To take the Establishment clause and use it to turn the Freedom of Expression Clause upside down is absurd and contrary to the history, context and intent of those who wrote that amendment…