Democrats Push Bills for Bible Study in Schools
 

Democrats in 2 Southern States Push Bills on Bible Study

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/27/po...7religion.html

By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Published: January 27, 2006

WASHINGTON, Jan. 26 — Democrats in Georgia and Alabama, borrowing an idea usually advanced by conservative Republicans, are promoting Bible classes in the public schools. Their Republican opponents are in turn denouncing them as "pharisees," a favorite term of liberals for politicians who exploit religion.

Democrats in both states have introduced bills authorizing school districts to teach courses modeled after a new textbook, "The Bible and Its Influence."

In Indiana, Democratic legislators are among the leaders of a bipartisan effort to preserve the recitation of specifically Christian prayers in the Statehouse. In Virginia, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine relied heavily on religious themes and advertised on evangelical radio stations to win election last fall; Democratic Party leaders have called his campaign a national model.

In an interview, Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, promised that Democrats would do a better job talking about values to religious voters. "We have done it in a secular way, and we don't have to," he said, adding, "I think teaching the Bible as literature is a good thing."

Some liberals are unhappy, however. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, argued that "The Bible and Its Influence" was "problematic" because it omitted "the bad and the ugly uses of the Bible," like the invocation of Scripture to justify racial segregation.

-Rudey

What could it hurt?

Today, some Muslim is in court seeks to pray at school.

Religious feelings aside, I think that since many of the sayings we use on a daily basis are from one religion or another, a course such as this would be invaluable. We had one in high school.

In our class, one part was assigning everyone a few Bible verses, and having them find out the modern day usage. Some of those included:

-Alas, Babylon
-pillar of salt
-two by two
-to everything there is a season
-through a glass darkly
-the Alpha and the Omega
and many more.

There were a lot more from many other religions, too; it's been a while since high school, though!

Lol. Where are all the hippies here that normally bitch when a religious matter comes up in the gov't?

Surely they won't be silent on this issue simply because it is being posed by a democrat.

I think that this is a good idea to teach the Bible as Literature in schools. They aren't supporting it from a religious slant; they are exploring something that is relevant in our culture.

I would want to see the syllabus. As an elective course, a "Bible and it's Influence" sounds interesting. I imagine it to be a study of how the Bible has influenced our culture. That's different than making someone pray to a God that they may or may not believe in or saying that the Bible is precisely true and accurate. I would think it should be an elective course and not a required course. I am not opposed to the studying of religion in school, as an education based focus saying "this is what other people believe". I think everybody should have a course like that and learn about Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and Buddhism. It depends on how it presented though. That is very different than a teacher saying "We're going to pray to Allah while facing Mecca today" or "We're going to do a rain dance to the Rain God".

I am completely appalled! This doesn't belong in public schools, "literature" or not.

It was taught in my highschool Advanced Placement class and in one of my World Lit classes in college. I don't see them making it a required thing, but even if it was part of a required class (like my English class in highschool), why is it something to be apalled at? It is something that affects our culture whether you agree with it or not. Why wouldn't it belong in public schools? Is there a mandatory conversion?


Edited because requiring and mandatory was redundant.

Children don't need to be exposed to religious works of other religions unless their parents permit it. Will parents get to opt-out their kids as they can for certain areas of Health class?

If children go to a public school, they're exposed. I wouldn't see there being an opt out like there would be in Health classes... I remember the section in English being like 3 days long. I also remember reading portions of the Koran, and being completely offended when I read Candide...
If it were offered as an elective and your child opted to take it, would you not let them?

My Honors English class Freshman year in high school was focused on religion in literature. We would read poems and books and find any biblical refernces in there such as numbers used or names. It was very interesting. Religion was never preached during class. It was more a research-based class on how the First Testament has influenced today's literature. We learned about how ancient Greek religion influenced today's literature.

As long as the class is kept factual-based in that we learn where the Bible has influenced literature rather than having a Sunday School style classroom that read Bible passages, I'm ok with it.

I'm a Christian, and I agree - I wouldn't want it to be taught in a kind of Sunday School format either.

I'm taking a Judaism, Christianity and Islam class, and I'm really enjoying it. I'm also taking Sociology of Religion. I think it's important to understand how we are impacted by the different religions in the world.

What bothers me so much about teaching a class like this, or anything related to the Bible, in public school is that it's going to leave out other religions and, in my opinion, that endorses the religions it includes over those it excludes -- which is completely inappropriate for public school. Why can't these things be taught by religious institutions -- why do people feel the need to include them in public school curriculum?

The above applies only to elementary, middle, and high schools -- I'm not going to object to anything taught in college.

Religion is for the weak.

If this is an elective course, then I don't see the problem. Many schools offer a course on world religions, which may or may not include the reading of scriptures.

Because it is in many ways an integral part of our culture. I think it's a good idea, but agree that students should be exposed to other religions' works as well.

Well, in many ways, lots of things are part of our culture -- like sex.

Word.

While the classes proposed are elective, I see this as the beginning of a slippery slope. We start letting electives in, and then folks will feel like they can start teaching Christian ideology. I just dont see folks stopping at "The Bible says this"...at some point some "Christianity is the way to go" is gonna sneak in. Even if a child does take the class to learn about historical and literature references, its not a time to preach the virtues of Christianity.

Bible as literature classes and creationism ("Intelligent design") in science have no place in the public schools. I'm sure the ACLU will have a field day with this, even if it is sponsored by Democrats.

you know a lot of things have been cut out of the public school curricula and I think that has led to a severe problem in terms of the kids' overall exposure to the world around them. I think this course should be included as well as courses in the other religions. It could even be a course that teaches the cornerstones of all the religions at the same time. There are only 7 major ones (I think). I also would like to see courses come back like basic Civics classes and courses that teach kids how to manage money and go more in depth with American and world history. There are SO many things American children need to learn and the more that is left out, edited out and cut out, the less educated and exposed kids will be which will eventually lead to more ignorance and bigotry. Good citizenship skills and patriotism are learned young.

So, you all think that a high school kid shouldn't know what a Jezebel is, or a Pandora's box, Mother Earth, or karma? Because each of these are phrases that are part and parcel of our daily vocabulary.

I gave a few examples of some of the Biblical phrases that I remembered from high school. The Rolling Stones called a greatest hits album Through the Past Darkly as a play on "through the glass darkly", while the Byrds used "To everything there is a season" from Ecclesiastes in their song Turn, Turn, Turn. The tv show My Name Is Earl is BASED on karma, for pete's sake!

I would be totally against the teaching of the actual religion itself in a public school, but I think a kid who doesn't know these type of phrases is already years behind in literature.

So it's a right flank?

I don't really like it.. both parties competing to see who can be the most religious will turn this place into a Jerry Fallwell paradise within 10-15 years.

Eh, I never learned religious stuff in school and I know these things. I mean, I wouldn't want to expect most people to be so brilliant, but these seem like the kind of cultural catch-phrases that can be taught by parents or picked up somewhere.

What she said. Didn't learn or hear about these specific things in school. Kinda common sense if you ask me. You just catch onto them sooner or later.

COSIGN!

I have a problem with teaching religion in school. You can have morals and teach morals and how to be a responsible adult without "endorsing" a particular religion, or set of religions. Its not the public schools place to do the job of a parent, and if a parent doesnt teach a child about religion, perhaps there is a reason for that.

To me, what you're advocating would be stepping on the toes of the parents. A parent has the right to expose their child to the religions that they see fit, and the schools should not be contradicting that.

And I don't know where Civics is omitted, but in my school district (where my sister is still a student) it is required to graduate.

I'm not talking about ADDING another course, I'm talking about having a portion of an ordinary literature/English class discussing/teaching the etymology of different phrases. This maybe takes 2-3 weeks of class. If there's a teenager who would be absolutely wounded by learning from where any phrase came, then that child needs to be taking the short school bus in the first place!

In a public high school, my world history class taught me about various countries as well as the religions that were practiced. Some kids in class were able to provide more information on certain religions or countries because that's where their family came from. Somehow my friends and I made it through this class unscathed with such an open exchange of ideas.

In public grade schools, there used to be classes in deportment (sp?)and citizenship. Considering how much kids are acting up in and out of the classroom, parents who are working too many hours to put food on the table may need the school to come back in and bring these classes back.

We had this in high school. It was an elective, and it provided an overview of the history and belief systems of the major world religions. Some of the English classes read Bible stories (for instance, I think my fiance's class read the Book of Ruth in their unit on ancient myths and legends). While in my classes, we never directly read the Bible, I definitely used it a lot. I mean, for poetry explications and the like, it was pretty necessary - you try to make sense of John Donne without it!

I don't know about having an entire class on "The Bible as Literature" - that does seem a little extreme (and like catering to conservative Christian voters that really shouldn't be catered to, imo), it's something that does need to be included, in reasonable ways, in our curriculum. What I think is funny, though, is that most fundamentalist Christians will spit and scream if you tell them that the Bible is a literary and historical work and should be taught in schools in the same way that we teach Greek and Roman mythology ...

Same here. Not one day of non-public education, but we were able to learn these things without any problems.

And OPhiARen3, I'm one of those fundamentalist Christians you're so worried about. I'm talking 2-3 weeks of learning basic information about various phrases which are within the realm of one religion or another. I would NOT want a public school education teaching ANY religious philosophy, and am against prayer in school (although a moment of silence can benefit anyone).

Then you aren't one of the fundamentalist Christians I'm worried about :D

I have no problem with people being serious about their religion (I'm much rather someone take their religion seriously than not care about it at all - I don't get that ...). What I don't like is when people try to use public institutions to force their religion on others - and it looks like we agree on that :)

What I was saying with my comment is that a lot of fundamentalist Christians object to the Bible being taught any other way than as a religious text, when in fact it is extremely important in many other ways.

When they teach about how homosexuality is an "Abomination" in the bible will you be supporting it?

Because before when you associated religion with Republican, you seemed to have a problem with it.

-Rudey