removed a hand-lettered sign identifying
a room as the "Muslim Student Prayer Room"
after a school employee contacted the Tribune questioning the
constitutionality of setting up what looked like a mosque.
Posted on 10/25/2001 12:41:04 PM PDT by rface
According to the employee, who asked not to be named, inside the room there was also a sign asking visitors to "remove shoes when entering the mosque."
"The sign is not a good idea," Principal Bruce Brotzman said Tuesday. "It sounds like we set up a mosque in our school or" if it were "for Christians, a sanctuary. We are not going to do that. But to make space available to accommodate kids, that is something ... we want to do."
Practicing Muslims pray five times a day during specified windows of time. At least one of those times falls during the school day. Brotzman said that each year, students look for space for the daytime prayer. This year he offered them a small basement room after an elementary school’s gifted-education program moved out. The room has no window and is not identified with a room number.
"The most important thing is to find a place that is clean and quiet," said senior Rehab El-Buri. Last year students used the Performing Arts Center but would periodically find it occupied by a class or locked. She estimated about 30 students use the room from time to time, though on days when they have cars they might drive to the mosque downtown instead.
Rehab said Muslim students weren’t upset to see the signs go down. They were posted by a student whose family immigrated here two months ago and who is suffering from culture shock, she said.
"I know they didn’t open this room just for Muslim students. We may have the greatest need, but this is by no means a mosque," Rehab said. "I think the room should be open to Christians or Buddhists who want to pray."
Steve Benen, spokesman for the Washington-based group Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said the question of how far schools must go to accommodate daytime prayer by students has not been settled legally.
"The policy most schools take is one of accommodation, which seems to work for everyone involved," he said. "The caveat is that it must not be disruptive. … Rooms being set aside for exclusively religious use, that would be legally problematic."
Earlier this year, Americans United wrote letters of opposition to a Kentucky high school that allowed an outside person to renovate a classroom into a chapel, complete with pews carved with crosses, a pulpit and a copy of the Lord’s Prayer posted. The school set up the room for students who wanted to come voluntarily.
After communication with Americans United, the Kentucky school converted its chapel into a different school use.
Brotzman said Assistant Principal Kathy Ritter has explained to Muslim students that the room is not exclusively "theirs."
Brotzman said Christian students haven’t asked to use a school room during the day, though requests to use space before and after school aren’t uncommon. A flier posted on school bulletin boards advertised a meeting yesterday of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the school commons. The meeting was to include songs and worship.
Rehab said her years at Rock Bridge have been the best of her life in terms of helping her feel comfortable expressing who she is. In middle school, she was "too much of a conformist" to break away to pray during the day. In junior high she gained confidence, but administrators didn’t help students find a room to use.
"When new Muslim families come to Columbia, I always recommend their kids go to Rock Bridge because they have been so overwhelmingly cooperative with us and so understanding," she said.
BTW -- Yanks in 5 ;-)
This article should make everyone think very, very carefully about "prayer in school." Yes, I know you will all say, "Oh, this will never happen to me because I homeschool," or whatever, but consider - some day there will very likely be schools here as there are now in England, where the vast majority of students are Muslim. Minority students of other religions may very well find themselves praying five times a day to Mecca, and might be pressured for NOT wearing a headscarf. Sounds crazy? Look at the English situation now. If prayer in school means prayers to Allah, forget it. People can pray on their own time and on their own dime. The school needs to NOT encourage this.
So don't make silly arguments. Don't patronize people. Don't lecture on what the courts have ruled. We all know what courts have ruled. I don't care what the courts have ruled. I don't care what judges say. Judges gave us Dred Scott and other atrocities. So yes, when someone says, "Tell it to the judge", I do get testy.
Courts and judges have limited powers. They can only put people in jail and take away everything they own. They cannot make me agree with them, they cannot make wrong, right.
If you had not come to FR so late, if you did a little checking,you would know who here is in favor of government schools and who has been, for years, fighting the NEA and supporting www.sepschool.org
Your friend in Ashland, Missouri
rface; I don't see anything wrong with this, other than the actions taken by the recent arrival, he came from a world where there is little, if any, distinction between government and religion, I am certain that the more "seasoned" Islamic students will show him (or her) the ropes quickly.
Having said that, I also notice the statements by the principal that the room is open to any student who wishes to have a quiet place to pray, I would love to know how many Christian students take advantage of the principal's offer on a daily basis.
One last thought, forget that these kids practice Islam, and make them Christians. What kinds of comments do you think we would get in FR about a bunch of kids whose faith in God is this strong, a principal who tried to help them out, and some snitch who called the media in on them?
Kind of shows you what the real agenda is: DECHRISTIANIZE AMERICA. And right now the weapon of choice is Islam.
Watch and pray!
Oh, and look what's happened to our heartland!
Note to all RC's: Pray the Rosary daily.
I know that the principle in this school has stated that anyone else can use the room.....but this is a brand new development. There was never a room before, and its not because no-one had asked for one.
There are plenty of Christian kids within the Columbia Public School system who find ways to pray and worship together, but there are always new obsticles for them to work around. This case demonstrates that the school system is willing to remove obsticles when it wants to. It wants to remove them for these Muslim students - it won't with Christians.
It seemed to me that there where several Christian groups active in the school, and they held regular meetings in classrooms before and after school.
Now, I know that there is quite a difference between providing students with a place to pray, and for the school to openly sponsor some sort of prayer during a school related function, there's the major line drawn by the ACLU and their minions, but they can't stop kids from praying on their own.
Generally speaking, Christianity does not have a strict requirement like Islam, Christian doctrine does not specifically expect us to pray a certain number of times during the day, at a certain time. That's the reason why Muslim students looked for a place to carry out their afternoon prayers.
I would imagine that this principal may have allowed Christian students the same room if they had asked.
Had they asked? I don't know, and I guess unless your child attends that School, and is a devout Christian, we won't know for sure.
Then you add that if praying at a certain time of the day is required that then they would be given this. I see. Congress shall make no law...means that someone at the school level can make an accomidation for foreign students who's laws supercede the First Amendment...namely the free excercise of religion by a law written by and for Christians living and governing themselves here, when Islam was still overseas, content with its Medieval superstition, cruelty, and converting nonbelievers by the sword.
And finally, you said Constitutional law is "fairly well established" regarding separation of church and state. I believe that the time is rapidly approaching when this will again be on the SCUS docket.
The famous quotation of Jefferson agreeing that there is a wall of separation between church and state was written to a clergyman in one of the original Thirteen Colonies who feared that the state was indeed setting up a wall to forbid his own congregation freedom to practice its religion.
True those are Jefferson's words, but what the anti-Christians quote isn't what Jefferson really meant. He meant that the figurative wall was to wall the state off from abridging the freedom TO worship; not the freedom FROM worship, and especially to deny the devout their religious freedom to worship as they saw fit.
Freezing out Christian worship, and giving the Muslim's the right to do so will be subject to bitter, ongoing dispute. Some of this dispute has already resulted in several bombings of innocent civilians in both public and private buildings, probably the infection of innocent civilians with biological agents, and quite possibly other means of death and intimidation that we have yet to see.
This will be taken to the streets, just as it has been taken to our public buildings, airlines, and now, schools.
Pick your side carefully. You might die for your beliefs. Islam is the wrong belief to die for. Our First Amendment rights permit me to say this. Heed these rights, even if Islam doesn't.
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