Free Republic

Religious expression in public schoolshttp://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA051507.01A.praying_kids.346b298.html http://tinyurl.com/2f9gzw Web Posted: 05/14/2007 11:03 PM CDT J. Michael Parker Express-News Religion Writer Zach Van Veldhuizen believes Jesus should be honored in public schools. The MacArthur High School senior doesn't understand why prayers or other religious expressions at school-sponsored events would be a problem. But Katina Rajunov, a Clark High School senior, believes that religious messages given at school-sponsored events might make students of differing faiths feel excluded. Enter the Texas Legislature, which has joined the fray most commonly the province of school district officials, who often face a conundrum in the religious freedoms of...

Elizabeth May's bizarre speech National Post: lead Editorial Published: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 On Sunday, Elizabeth May, the leader of the Green Party of Canada, returned to London, Ont., where she lost a byelection five months ago. Although Ms. May was not on the campaign trail, she was preaching the Greens' environmental catechism, this time from the pulpit of a local United Church. Her odd sermon should concern not only Green party members who hope to take the party into the political mainstream, but also Liberal leader Stephane Dion, who recently struck a controversial political alliance with Ms. May...

A plan being shoved down a fast track in the Oregon Legislature would give homosexuals a vast range of new state laws they could use to impose their moral perspective on Christians across the state, according to opponents who fear for their speech and religious expression rights. Senate Bill 2, on its face, is written to enshrine in state law special protections for homosexuals by classifying them as a protected civil rights group. But hundreds of pastors – whose churches include tens of thousands of evangelical Christians – are horrified by what they see advancing virtually without opposition. "Senate Bill...

Another category of Christian, however, is rapidly losing its traditional identity in our culture: Evangelical. While it never made distinctions on theological grounds, that term could always be counted upon to identify those Christians who are conservative, Protestant, culturally influential and outspoken about their faith. With recent developments, however, the defining elements of Evangelical may soon go the way of the much-encompassing Christian. Why? Because some who purport to speak for all evangelicals are being sucked into marginal issues that are usually harped on by America-hating liberals. And because conservative Christians are allegedly being divided, the mainstream media is eating...

Last weekend the top two celebrities in the Democratic presidential contest, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, ventured south to Selma to pitch their campaigns to voters in black churches. If the visits evoked concern by any liberal commentator anywhere about the separation of church and state, it was not evident on Monday. Or Tuesday. Or… Imagine, however, how many would have found themselves “frightened” and “angry” if a couple of bigwig Republicans had pitched their messages from the pulpit to evangelicals. It really is time for the media to get to one standard on whether it’s permissible for candidates to...

WHY ARE POLITICIANS MAKING POLITICAL SPEECHES IN CHURCHES? Obama spoke from the Brown Chapel AME Church in Selma, Alabama. Hillary, not to be outdone, spoke from another church a few blocks away. Hillary is being roundly ridiculed for trying her best to sound southerny. Kind of like condescending, patronizing, I-wanna-look-like-you every-word-is-two-syllables southerny. As if the audience can't tell the difference. But since the only time southern folks ever see real live politicians is when they are either running for something or shaking the money tree, they sit around and listen and look glad for getting some attention. I can abide...

Before David Paszkiewicz got to teach his accelerated 11th-grade history class about the United States Constitution this fall, he was accused of violating it. Shortly after school began in September, the teacher told his sixth-period students at Kearny High School that evolution and the Big Bang were not scientific, that dinosaurs were aboard Noah’s ark, and that only Christians had a place in heaven, according to audio recordings made by a student whose family is now considering a lawsuit claiming Mr. Paszkiewicz broke the church-state boundary.[snip] The student, Matthew LaClair, said that he felt uncomfortable with Mr. Paszkiewicz’s statements in...

A public-school handout urging young children in Virginia to attend a "Pagan ritual" tomorrow to "celebrate Yule" is sparking objections from concerned parents. "Amazing – government schools ban orthodox Christianity, but allow an openly pagan organization to proselytize six-year-olds!" one observer who asked for anonymity told WND. The concern has risen to such a level that the head of the Albemarle district in Charlottesville, Va., admits the policy allowing handouts may change, potentially eliminating them from all organizations. The flyer in question is from a group called NatureSpirit from the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Church, a Unitarian Universalist congregation that also...

It’s a tableau worthy of any 4-H Club county or state fair exhibit: The tiny West Virginia town of St. Albans (pop. 11,000) has put up a display in a local park that includes a manger - defined as "a container (usually in a barn or stable) from which cattle or horses feed"; a few animals; a couple of shepherds; a star (it’s nighttime); and a palm tree (this particular barn or stable must be in Phoenix). It cannot possibly be a Christmas display because the manger is not being used as a makeshift crib for the baby Jesus –...

THE US Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether a challenge can go forward arguing that President George W. Bush's faith-based initiative violates the constitutional requirement on church-state separation. The justices said they would hear a Bush administration appeal of a ruling that allowed a lawsuit by a Wisconsin group called the Freedom from Religion Foundation and three of its members to proceed. In January 2001, right after he became president, Mr Bush issued an executive order creating he White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives and similar centres in a number of federal agencies. The White House said...

The Tennessean is a Gannett newspaper and does not allow copying or excerpting of articles. Click on this link to read the article: ACLU sues Wilson County over alleged religious practices In my own words - the plantiffs are alledging a Christmas play, praying parents, national prayer day and teacher-led prayer in a public school have traumatized their child and they need attorneys’ fees and compensatory or nominal damages to get over it. The plantiffs are not named in the suit for fear they will be attacked and ostracized.

WASHINGTON — Sen. Orrin Hatch wants the Justice Department to correct what he and other senators see as a "misinterpretation" in a decision made in a New York bankruptcy case dealing with charitable contributions. Late last month, the court decided that certain people at higher income levels who are in Chapter 13 repayment plans cannot deduct charitable contributions when calculating their disposable income. "For people of faith in America, the obligation to tithe presents a significant part of the free exercise of religion, which is guaranteed to all Americans under the First Amendment," Hatch, R-Utah, along with Sen. Charles Grassley,...

AUSTIN - Public school students don't need to go to church on Sunday for a strong dose of religion — in some cases, according to a new study, they merely show up for class. . . . The 76-page report, titled "Reading, Writing and Religion: Teaching the Bible in Texas Public Schools," is one of the most ambitious looks so far at Bible courses that have sprouted in the nation's public high schools. The report was a joint effort by Mark Chancey, a biblical studies professor at Southern Methodist University, and the Education Fund of the Texas Freedom Network, a...

There is a hue and cry coursing through the more ardent supporters of President Bush's Iraq policy and its mostly a matter of disturbed semantics. It seems those supporters, including Bush himself, Rumsfeld (naturally) and U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum (more naturally) have pounced on the term "fascism" to be the easiest way to popularly press their suit for "staying the course" in Iraq. Their sense of history is most disappointing. From Rumsfeld most of all, who is the only one of this transformed trio to have lived during an era when democracy actually faced a do-or-die challenge from fascism. George...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill., Aug. 26 (UPI) -- Vashti McCollum, the plaintiff in a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case on religion in public schools, has died at 93 Champaign, Ill. McCollum challenged the religious education classes in the Champaign public schools. Her son, James, then in fifth grade, was required to attend a class against his will. In her lawsuit, McCollum argued that the classes were discriminatory because those for Protestants were held at the schools while classes for Catholics and Jews were held elsewhere. She lost in the state courts but won an 8-1 ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court. "The...

Church-state issues are among the most contentious and emotional issues in American life. Dozens are currently testing the bounds of the First Amendment's Establishment and Free Exercise clauses: school vouchers; government funding of faith-based social services; the role of faith in the public lives of judges, elected officials, legislators, pharmacists, doctors and lawyers; and the role of religion in public life, from Ten Commandments postings and the Pledge of Allegiance to religious groups' role in politics and prayers at public meetings. ReligionLink offers a diverse and extensive guide to individuals and organizations expert in these issues

A dispute in Georgetown, Del., underscores the rising tensions over religion in public schools.I spend a fair amount of time trying to convince other religious Jews that their concerns about Evangelical Christians are baseless, and that they should cooperate with them on common objectives such as preserving Israel, protecting religious freedom, social issues etc. The incidents described in this story is exactly the kind of thing they many of them are afraid of. And, that does not include the prayers per se, but the ridicule, and exclusionary nature of some of the prayers. What do my fellow conservatives advise I...

A federal judge ruled yesterday that the East Brunswick High School football coach can bend a knee and bow his head while his players recite pre-game prayers this season, ending a dispute that had mushroomed into a nationally recognized test of the separation of church and state. After nearly two hours of arguments, U.S. District Judge Dennis Cavanaugh sided with the coach, Marcus Borden, declaring "taking a knee" isn't praying and that the Middlesex County school district can't order him to stand still while his players perform a locker room ritual that spans decades. "Tradition plays a part, and the...

Spare us from the God-haters By MICHAEL COREN Toronto Sun July 22, 2006 In West Virginia local activists are trying to remove a picture of Jesus that has hung on the wall of a local school for many years. Various so-called civil liberties groups claim that such a portrait is an infringement of basic human rights. Elsewhere in the United States assorted opponents of organized religion have been fighting for decades to ban prayer in schools, to force teachers to take down copies of The Ten Commandments from classrooms and to eliminate all mentions of God from public halls...

In a speech to the Notre Dame student body during the 1984 U.S. presidential campaign, New York governor Mario Cuomo addressed the issue of church-state relations and the growing activism of the so-called Religious Right. The governor said: “Are we asking government to make criminal what we believe to be sinful because we ourselves can’t stop committing the sin? The failure here is not Caesar’s. This failure is our failure—the failure of the entire people of God”1 As a conservative Christian pastor who seeks to uphold biblical morality before two congregations on a weekly basis, I find the above question...