Posted on 03/14/2008 8:39:03 AM PDT by bs9021
Anti-Catholic Education
by: Malcolm A. Kline, March 14, 2008
The faithful are increasingly likely to face hostility to their beliefs in secular educational settings, the Catholic Leagues 2007 Report on Anti-Catholicism shows:
On February 21, 2007, A substitute teacher wiped the Ash Wednesday ashes off the forehead of a student at White County High School, the League reports. When the girl and her classmates protested, they were berated by teachers.
On April 19 in Lake Bluff, Illinois, A middle school teacher gave an assignment to her students pinpointing who was responsible for the Holocaust and listed Pope Pius XII along with Himmler and Goebels. ...
On June 25, in Columbus, Ohio, A federal judge ruled that employees whose religious beliefs conflict with the political positions of their labor unions cannot be forced to pay union dues. The ruling stemmed from a lawsuit by a Catholic schoolteacher, who refused to pay National Education Association dues because of the unions pro-abortion stance. The teacher sued Ohios State Employment Relations Board after the board ruled that only members of religions with historically held objections to union membership....
In the old days, Dont make a federal case out of it! was an exasperated plea that meant a matter was no big deal. In this age, such a recourse is about the only way that Catholics, or other people of faith, in the current circumlocution, can actually exercise their religious freedom in a country that was founded with that very liberty in mind...
(Excerpt) Read more at campusreportonline.net ...
This will spill over into Christian belief teachers also.
I believe they target the Catholic education because Catholics have always stood against abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, etc. — a lot of the things that they want to believe in.
In short, Catholics have God. These teachers (if you want to call them that) do not.
That sub is lucky her father didn't wipe the sub's forehead off his head.
Pope Pius was on the wrong list then. He and his Church saved 860,000+ Jews from the camps: more than all other organisations and private individuals combined.
That’s what I was thinking. That sub had NO BUSINESS even touching a child much less doing something like that. It’s so easy to be charged with child abuse these days.
What an idiot.
Catholic ping
school ping
Sad, sad, sad
If anyone besides my wife or I lays a hand on my child there had better be a very compelling reason.
If the "reason" offered is that the person who did was just in the mood to disrespect my child and Jesus, I would make sure they never touched anyone's child ever again.
I think they target Catholic education because they do a better job of educating children than the public, union controlled, schools. They feel threatened, and have for quite some time.
Ideology is a distant second.
Just remember what substitute teachers go through from students. I'm sure they thought they were just being "hazed" as the sub, and thought that the "Ashes for Ash Wednesday" explanation had to be a joke.
Catholics are going to go out and riot now.
(Sarcasm)
This teacher was in America, where one out of ever four people is Catholic.
If you are an American and have never heard of Catholicism, you lack the mental resources to be a substitute dogsitter, let alone a substitute teacher.
I mean, what could be sillier?
Your argument, for starters. I would probably refrain from characterizing Biblical practices as silly, moreover.
I substitute taught at one time for a short period of time and I NEVER would have dreamed of touching a child nor requiring them to wash something off their face. If I thought there was an issue of discipline, to the office they would go.
If some student claimed it had religious significance, then I would give them the benefit of the doubt. That was not her call to make.
I find it highly unlikely that ANY sub in this country had not heard of Ash Wednesday, considering two things: Her age (being old enough to substitute teacher) and the fact that Ash Wednesday has been marked on calendars for decades, including this year even. My current 2008 calendar has it marked and it’s just your generic calendar bought at Border’s.
She was WRONG, period. End of story.
Don’t forget, looting, burning cars, and chopping off people’s heads and other body parts.
Wideawake - I never implied that the teacher might have never heard of Catholicism. I said that there are a lot of people in the United States who have never heard of the particular practice of putting ash on a forehead on Ash Wednesday. Secondly, I never characterized any practice as silly. I wrote from the point of view of what a teacher, who had never heard of this practice, would have thought--that the kids were being kids and making up a story.
Metmom - Same as above. I never said they hadn't heard of Ash Wednesday - only that they were probably unaware of the practice of putting ash on a forehead. I also specifically made the point that I was not addressing the physical contact issue. (For that, they were definitely in the wrong.)
In short, the author of the piece, and those who have been reading it, have been reading it from the point of view of someone acquainted with Catholic practice and assuming that "everybody knows that". They don't. In fact, I just did a tour of my office to find out how many had ever heard of or were acquainted with any practice involving ashes on Ash Wednesday. I only found five people out of eleven who had ever heard of the ashes/forehead practice and most of them qualified their answer as a guess.
So that a secular teacher educated in secular schools teaching in a secular high school with no religious background whatsoever (as far as we know) may have reacted that way (other than the touching) is not unlikely to me at all. And if that is the case, it certainly wasn't Catholic-bashing. Dumb maybe, but not anti-Catholic.
We know that the retention in the faith rate for children who attend government schools who have been raised in active Christian homes is abysmal! Worse still, is that those who do remain active and profess to be Christian hold beliefs that could never be considered Christian! ( Yes! I have links!)
Surely, the consequences of sending a Catholic child to government school could not be any better than for Protestant Christian children.
For Catholic and Protestant Christian teachers, why are you abetting, aiding, propping up, and pushing forward a system that is officially godless? How can you justify teaching only part of the truth? How can you justify supporting a system that in every class, throughout the entire curriculum, and all textbooks has thoroughly scrubbed all reference to God and God's plan?
Why aren't you using your talents to build up Catholic and Protestant Christian schools so that children can be taught the WHOLE truth? Geeze! Surely the children know that what they are receiving in the government schools is not in accord with Christian belief. They can only come to one conclusion: Christians will support what they know is a lie for a paycheck!
I hope you are not attempting to sneak in a little bit of Christian philosophy into your classes. If you are, you are teaching the children that Christians are sneaky.
Surely the children will figure out that the NEA stands for everything that is anti-Christian, yet their Catholic and Protestant teachers are sending money to this organization every year, and even ask the godless NEA to be their **representatives**! What lesson is this teaching all the children about Catholics and Protestant Christians and their integrety?
As I see it believing Catholics and Protestant Christians have only two moral options:
1) They can vigorously, actively, and flamingly reject the godless agenda of the government schools and refuse to have anything to do with the NEA. ( Of course, they will likely be fired!)
Or...
2) Quit!
Anything less than the above is teaching children that Catholics and Protestant Christians are sneaky, will send money to the godless and anti-Christian NEA, support teaching only part of the truth, will support others who teach outright lies, are too timid and weak to protest, and be hypocrites for a paycheck.
Also,,,A Catholic or Protestant Christians MOST important mission field is their own children. Their second most important mission field is the children of their congregation! If their churches will not step up to help, they they need to do it themselves. It is THAT important!
If you turn your child over to Cesar don't be surprised if he returns home a Roman!
As a kid (and a Protestant), I attended a Catholic private school. I offended the entire class on Ash Wednesday by refusing to have the ashes put on my head. I didn’t know what it meant, and I didn’t want to get dirty. I doubt that my parents knew what it meant either.
Touch my child, go to the hospital.
Glad to see I wouldn't be alone in the county lockup :)

Catholics take to the street!

Catholic rage boy gets a medal
I stand ready to accept your offer of fully paid tuition at the local Catholic School for the next 12 years for our two daughters. Thanks!
1) Our kids had no bedrooms until the oldest was about 7. They slept on mats on the living room floor.
2) We had no new furniture.
3) We drove used cars.
4) We lived in a welfare Section 8 neighborhood.
5) Our clothing came from Good Will and I made any Sunday clothing that I wore.
6) We had a large garden and grew a lot of our fruits and vegetables.
I know of one family that literally lived in a tent! They were parents of 10 homeschooled children. The father was a construction worker. In the summer they moved to North and used state camp grounds. In the winter they went South.
For most families that I know private schooling and/or homeschooling is an option. They just don't want to make the downgrade in their lifestyle.
Sounds familiar: We live in a trailer park (1973 doublewide) and drive a 1990 Geo Metro and a couple old trucks and many of my clothes come from the thrift store. Nearly all the childrens’ do. The part about not enough bedrooms sounds VERY familiar! Neither of us is able to work enough to amount to anything but fortunately, through the Grace of God, I have reasonable savings.
Things at public school aren't so bad currently because the kindergarten and first grade teachers essentially share the same values we do. This is a very conservative area. But I am still concerned about middle school and beyond, especially when state law will force immoral curricula.
I don't have the temperament to home school myself but my wife does quite a bit of it as a supplement to public school. But as she grew up in a foreign country without access to much education she won't be able to do that through high school. Good luck to you and your family: you sound like very nice and capable people!
Steve
I have a suggestion:
Conservatives should start private foundations that would award private scholarships to students attending private schools. These conservative foundations could also award grants to conservative teachers willing to open mini-schools, micro-schools, one room school houses, virtual schools, tutoring centers, and one room school houses.
The scholarship foundations should look to today's technology and encourage innovative ways to deliver education. The brick and mortar school should be abandoned. It is expensive, has many regulation issues, and it is cruel to warehouse children like prisoners.
The foundations should also sponsor sports leagues. Our government schools are essentially running taxpayer monopoly farm teams for the big leagues, and offering an alternative would wean many communities away from their loyalty to their government schools.
Is this possible? Yes! If colleges and universities can have endowments in the billions, conservatives could do this for K-12 education.
Conservatives should STOP looking to churches to offer an alternative to the atheistic government schools. Ministers are NOT going to step up to the challenge. There are too many government employees sitting in the pews, and no minister is going to bite the hand that feeds him.
Catholic and Protestant Christians MUST solve this on their own without the help of their churches. As more parents move out of the government system the churches will be more willing to establish schools.
Public education went off a cliff generations ago. What we’re seeing now is the impact of hitting the rocks.
Please note that there's a BIG constitutional problem concerning the idea of secular educational settings.
Up to the late 1830s, local communities decided what was taught in their schools. In fact, all schools up to that time could be regarded as private schools that taught the local flavor of Christianity. Local schools were well within their 10th A. powers to do so.
But things changed in the late 1830s. More specifically, Protestant state lawmakers got spooked by large numbers of Catholic immigrants. Protestant lawmakers didn't want Catholicism to spread and so made state-level laws, the infamous Blaine laws, which prevented Catholicism from being taught in local, community-supported schools. Local schools, called common schools, under Protestant influence essentially tried to force Catholic children to learn Protestant Christian beliefs.
The reason that Protestant Christianity is no longer taught in public schools is as follows. Justice Black was a Baptist and probably shared the beliefs of some Baptists that Matthew 22:21 was God's call for absolute c&s separation. When Justice Black got the opportunity to force his personal beliefs regarding absolute c&s separtion into religion-related public school cases, he did so. And here's how he did it...
Justice Black decided in the Everson case that Jefferson's "wall of separation" meant that the establishment clause was meant to apply to the states.
However...
"Former" Klansman Justice Black "overlooked" that Jefferson had also acknowledged that the Founders had written the 1st and 10th Amendments in part to reserve government power to address religious issues uniquely to the states. In fact, Jefferson had done so on at least three occasions. See for yourself.
"3. Resolved that it is true as a general principle and is also expressly declared by one of the amendments to the constitution that the powers not delegated to the US. by the constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively or to the people: and that no power over the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or freedom of the press being delegated to the US. by the constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, all lawful powers respecting the same did of right remain, & were reserved, to the states or the people..." --Thomas Jefferson, Kentucky Resolutions, 1798. http://tinyurl.com/oozooSo by quoting Jefferson to help justify his scandalous interpretation of the establishment clause, Justice Black essentially quoted the worst possible person to pull off his dirty work."In matters of religion, I have considered that its free exercise is placed by the Constitution independent of the powers of the general government. I have therefore undertaken on no occasion to prescribe the religious exercises suited to it; but have left them as the Constitution found them, under the direction and discipline of State or Church authorities acknowledged by the several religious societies." --Thomas Jefferson: 2nd Inaugural Address, 1805. ME 3:378 http://tinyurl.com/jmpm3
"I consider the government of the United States as interdicted by the Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or exercises. This results not only from the provision that no law shall be made respecting the establishment or free exercise of religion, but from that also which reserves to the states the powers not delegated to the United States. Certainly, no power to prescribe any religious exercise or to assume authority in religious discipline has been delegated to the General Government. It must then rest with the states, as far as it can be in any human authority." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Miller, 1808. http://tinyurl.com/nkdu7
Finally, the reason that little is being done about perverted interpretations of the Constitution by corrupt justices is because ignorance of the Constitution and how the government is supposed to work is epidemic. Widespread constitutional ignorance is evidenced by the following links.
http://tinyurl.com/npt6tThe consequence of widespread constitutional ignorance is that both federal and state governments are walking all over our freedoms, particularly our religious freedoms as evidenced by the politically correct idea of "secular educational settings."
http://tinyurl.com/hehr8
The bottom line is that the people need to reconnect with the intentions of the Founders as reflected by the Constitution and its history, particularly where the teaching of religion to our children is concerned, people's 14th A. protections respected. The people need to quit sitting on their hands and petition lawmakers, judges and justices who are not upholding their oaths to defend the Constitution, demanding that they resign from their jobs.
Public education went off a cliff generations ago.
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Government schools have ALWAYS been a constitutional and freedom of conscience nightmare. They are now, and they always will be.
Government schools and the First Amendment and free of conscience can not coexist. It is axiomatic!
The bottom line is that the people need to reconnect with the intentions of the Founders as reflected by the Constitution and its history
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If our Founders could have forseen compulsory government schooling as it exists today, they would have specifically included freedom from government education in our Bill of Rights!
There may not have been a 10th Amendment conflict to having government schools, but compulsory attendance, compulsory funded government schools have ALWAYS been in conflict with every right outlined in the First Amendment.
Government schools are NOT now, never have been, and never will be compatible with the First Amendment! This is true even if the school district were the size of a suburban subdivision block! One neighbor gets to threaten the other neighbor with armed police action if they do not subject their children to the government's NON-NEUTRAL political, cultural and religious worldview!
One neighbor gets to force another neighbor's child ( who has committed no crime) into government prison-like buildings. The government tells the child to shut up. The government forbids unapproved publishing and the right to freely practice and express religious belief. It is the government who determines with whom the child will assemble. And,,,Finally, the government subjects the child to non-stop government proselytizing in the government religion which is atheistic Secular Humanism at present.
Let’s assume, as you say, that the teacher was fresh off the ship from Pluto and didn’t have a calendar, most of which say “Ash Wednesay” on, you know, Ash Wednesday.
So, we’ll assume all that. Why did the teacher touch the child? Because, I’m sorry, I can’t set the physical contact issue aside. And I can’t set aside that there is a teacher teaching anywhere that is unaware of Christian Culture to the degree that this one would have had to have been.
If the are that culturally unaware, they should not be teaching. If they were aware and have some prejudice against Catholics, they should not be teaching. And finally, if they can’t keep their hands to themselves, they should not be teaching.
How much would the total be? I know what I am paying for two (about $7000 in NJ, one of the highest cost of living states).
What level of sacrifice would be worth an education which is Christian, which is equal or more likely superior to the Public schools academically, and which ensures your kids are not propagandized all year with homosexual, anti-Christian, liberal, multi-culti indoctrination?
I pay the tuition check with a smile.
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I homeschooled, so my expenses to **ransom** my children from the police enforced government indoctrination camps were:
1) About $500/child in books and supplies.
2) Loss of my income per year. ( I hold a doctorate in one of the very highest paying health professions.)
There were no private schools in our area that were supportive to our family's sect of Christianity, so homeschooling was our only option.
What I resent are 2 things:
1) That unless I paid extra, the government literally had police power over our lives. ( Real bullets in those guns on the hip.) Government school brown shirts could literally send out foster care workers with the power to make our lives hell on earth!
2) That I not only supported the education of my own children, but I was forced ( under threat of imprisonment) to pay for the government's godless, Secular Humanist, Marxist religious proselytizing of other people's children in the government indoctrination camps!
I am not smiling. :-(
One family I know lived in a tent ( literally!) with their 10 kids. They homeschooled all of them. The dad was a construction worker. In the winter they moved South. In the summer he worked in the North. At least this family was not paying property taxes that fed the godless religion of the government schools!
I’m not sure what kind of an additional sacrifice I can make. We don’t have any income now.
Well that is certainly an extreme example. I’m sorry. I hope you find work soon.
That is not the normal situation.
No, I didn’t mean it that way. We aren’t hurting, just frugal. Although I had to stop working 9 years ago, the Lord has graced us with (most) everything we need, including substantial savings which we’ve only drawn down by 10% after all these years. I bet not many people who DID HAVE two incomes all this time can live for almost a decade on a fraction of their savings! Save as much as you can in your 401K, IRA, or just plain savings!
I should have added — if public school conditions around here deteriorate to the point they are unacceptable — that hasn’t happened yet, IMO — we will have to use savings to send the kids to a Christian school. Although the idea of that still makes me uncomfortable, since it will be a big chunk never to be replaced.
I understand.
But then again, the original question stands.
What level of sacrifice would be worth an education which is Christian?
Which is equal or more likely superior to the Public schools academically?
Which ensures your kids are not propagandized all year with homosexual, anti-Christian, liberal, multi-culti indoctrination?
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This post is on lock. That is too bad. It is an excellent essay. It is so sad, but so true. My heart is broken.
That's just vulgar, invincible ignorance. It's probably a violation of a "no touching" policy as well.
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