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Thread: Atheist Group Shutdowns Kansas School “Operation Christmas Child” Participation

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    Quote Originally Posted by Private Pickle View Post
    Well there are about 8 that I can think of but what is your take on McCollum v. Board of Education?
    I am really not interested in court decisions. Those are nothing more than the opinions of judges. I am interested in the actual text of a law that prohibits activities like a religion themed school play.

    With regard to McCollum, I think it was a bad decision.
    “Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue.” - Barry Goldwater

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  3. #22

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    Quote Originally Posted by Chris View Post
    No, I wouldn't object. How could you teach any history of the US without mention of Christianity and the big part it played. Would history would have to include other religions. Also any comparative religion class, as you say, not sure you'd find that until college but still that's fine. It's not establishing or exercising religion.
    That is almost exactly my feeling on the subject.

    Thanks.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cletus View Post
    Prohibited by what, exactly?

    It is not the Constitution. I don't believe there is anything in the US Code that prohibits it. What prohibits schools from sponsoring a religious themed children's play?

    Please be specific and include a citation if you can.
    The school’s involvement with this program is very clearly an impermissible endorsement of religion. If you clicked on the web site for the program, it appears to be more of a Christian evangelization program than anything else. From the web site:

    The mission of Operation Christmas Child is to provide God’s love in a tangible way to children in need around the world, and together with the local church worldwide, to share the Good News of Jesus Christ.

    Every box is an opportunity to reach a child with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

    Borden v. Sch. Dist. of the Twp. of East Brunswick​, 523 F.3d 153 (3rd Cir. 2008), ​cert. denied,​ 129 S.Ct. 1524 (2009) describes the endorsement test as follows:

    Under the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." U.S. Const. amend. I. This provision applies equally to the states, including public school systems, through the Fourteenth Amendment. See Wallace v. Jaffree,472 U.S. 38, 49-50, 105 S. Ct. 2479, 86 L. Ed. 2d 29 (1985). The Supreme Court has set forth three tests for determining whether governmental action violates the Establishment Clause: the coercion test, the Lemon test, and the endorsement test. Modrovich, 385 F.3d at 400-01. We do not address whether Borden's conduct violates the Establishment Clause under the coercion[18] and Lemon[19]tests because we find that Borden's behavior violates the Establishment Clause under the endorsement test.

    [I]The endorsement test applies "in cases involving state participation in a religious activity." See Santa Fe, 530 U.S. at 308, 120 S. Ct. 2266. For example, in Santa Fe, the leading case on prayers before high school football games, the Supreme Court used the endorsement test in considering whether a school district violated the Establishment Clause where its policy allowed a student to deliver a pre-game prayer based on a voting system. Id. Here, Borden, an employee of the School District as both the head football coach and a tenured teacher, would like to bow his head and take a knee while students pray. Thus, the endorsement test is applicable here because these facts involve a state employee engaging in the religious activity of students in some fashion.

    The relevant question under the endorsement test is "whether a reasonable observer familiar with the history and context of the display would perceive the display as a government endorsement of religion." Modrovich, 385 F.3d at 401; see also Am. Civil Liberties Union Greater Pittsburgh Chapter,492 U.S. at 596, 109 S. Ct. 3086 (adopting the endorsement test). The test does not focus on the government's subjective purpose when behaving in a particular manner, but instead focuses on the perceptions of the reasonable observer. Modrovich, 385 F.3d at 401.
    I don’t see how any reasonable observer would conclude that this was not an exercise of the school in endorsing Christian religious activities.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cletus View Post
    That makes sense, but give me your input here. What if it was a class about religion, but not advocating a particular religion? Say, a class that focused on comparing the basic tenets of various religions, their similarities, their differences, but did not tout any one as superior to any other.

    Would you object to that?

    I would kind of like to throw that question out to the general board, both those who support a particular religion and those who do not.
    A class devoted to Comparative Religion, presented from an objective, academic viewpoint, would be perfectly fine in my opinion. If it were truly conducted that way I can't see how anyone could object on establishment grounds. I would foresee most of the objections coming from seriously religious parents, who wouldn't want their own Faith presented in that way...and might not want information about other religious Faiths talked about at all.

    When I was in my twenties I belonged to a number of what most folks would probably consider to be "fundamentalist" denominations. In the late '70s I was even licensed to preach by a Southern Baptist church in Northern California. One thing these churches all had in common was their opposition to the idea of their members learning about other religious Faiths, other than in a very controlled and critical way, i.e. pamphlets detailing those other Faiths' failings or, in extreme cases, linking them to Satan. When I converted to Catholicism and visited my first Catholic bookstore I was amazed at the number and variety of books, scholarly and otherwise, about other religions to be found there - books that were dedicated to genuinely understanding other's religious beliefs, rather than simply disparaging them. Unvaryingly, the priests with whom I studied in the years that followed seemed to have the same attitude: your faith should be strong enough to learn about other's beliefs without losing your own.

    One of the best volumes on the subject of comparative religion I ever encountered was 'The Faith of Other Men' by a Canadian Presbyterian minister named Wilfred Cantwell Smith. It's a classic, relatively short work, which I believe is still in print.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cletus View Post
    That makes sense, but give me your input here. What if it was a class about religion, but not advocating a particular religion? Say, a class that focused on comparing the basic tenets of various religions, their similarities, their differences, but did not tout any one as superior to any other.

    Would you object to that?

    I would kind of like to throw that question out to the general board, both those who support a particular religion and those who do not.

    Good idea. Sounds interesting. I wouldn't object at all.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sybil Ludington View Post
    Rice bowl? I've never heard that term before...
    It was very popular in the military I served in.
    Call your state legislators and insist they approve the Article V convention of States to propose amendments.


    I pledge allegiance to the Constitution as written and understood by this nation's founders, and to the Republic it created, an indivisible union of sovereign States, with liberty and justice for all.

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    Quote Originally Posted by RichardMZhlubb View Post
    The school’s involvement with this program is very clearly an impermissible endorsement of religion. If you clicked on the web site for the program, it appears to be more of a Christian evangelization program than anything else. From the web site:




    Borden v. Sch. Dist. of the Twp. of East Brunswick​, 523 F.3d 153 (3rd Cir. 2008), ​cert. denied,​ 129 S.Ct. 1524 (2009) describes the endorsement test as follows:



    I don’t see how any reasonable observer would conclude that this was not an exercise of the school in endorsing Christian religious activities.
    It is charity.
    Call your state legislators and insist they approve the Article V convention of States to propose amendments.


    I pledge allegiance to the Constitution as written and understood by this nation's founders, and to the Republic it created, an indivisible union of sovereign States, with liberty and justice for all.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MisterVeritis View Post
    It is charity.
    It’s a Christian evangelism charity, something no public school should be promoting.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cletus View Post
    I am really not interested in court decisions. Those are nothing more than the opinions of judges. I am interested in the actual text of a law that prohibits activities like a religion themed school play.

    With regard to McCollum, I think it was a bad decision.
    You said this:

    Quote Originally Posted by Cletus View Post
    Prohibited by what, exactly?

    It is not the Constitution. I don't believe there is anything in the US Code that prohibits it. What prohibits schools from sponsoring a religious themed children's play?

    Please be specific and include a citation if you can.
    I gave you a specific citation and you say you really don't care? Why waste my time?
    I find your lack of faith...disturbing...

    -Darth Vader

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    Quote Originally Posted by Private Pickle View Post
    You said this:


    I gave you a specific citation and you say you really don't care? Why waste my time?
    I said I wasn't interested in some judge's opinion and what I was looking for is an actual citation, the actual verbiage used in a law that prohibits such activity. The First Amendment does not have anything like that in it. I don't believe there is anything in the US Code like that. Some judge somewhere down the line just pulled it out of his ass and decided things like school plays or religious displays in public spaces somehow became a violation of
    "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof".

    How does a school allowing a religious themed kid's play violate "Congress shall establish no law..."? If anything, it seems to violate the "prohibiting the free exercise thereof" clause when a judge shuts it down.

    So, I am not trying to waste your time. I am looking for a law, something in the United States Constitution or the US Code that actually prohibits such activity.
    “Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue.” - Barry Goldwater

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