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Bible Study is Coming to the Schoolsnews clipped by DreamOfPeace on August 2, 2005 - 8:39am
New York Times
Bible Course Becomes a Test for Public Schools in Texas
The council calls its course a nonsectarian historical and literary survey class within constitutional guidelines requiring the separation of church and state. But a growing chorus of critics says the course, taught by local teachers trained by the council, conceals a religious agenda. The critics say it ignores evolution in favor of creationism and gives credence to dubious assertions that the Constitution is based on the Scriptures, and that "documented research through NASA" backs the biblical account of the sun standing still. In the latest salvo, the Texas Freedom Network, an advocacy group for religious freedom, has called a news conference for Monday to release a study that finds the national council's course to be "an error-riddled Bible curriculum that attempts to persuade students and teachers to adopt views that are held primarily within conservative Protestant circles." ..... In one teaching unit, students are told, "Throughout most of the last 2,000 years, the majority of men living in the Western world have accepted the statements of the Scriptures as genuine." The words are taken from the Web site of Grant R. Jeffrey Ministries' Prophecy on Line. The national council's efforts are endorsed by the Center for Reclaiming America, Phyllis Schlafly's group the Eagle Forum, Concerned Women for America and the Family Research Council, among others. Students will begin taking the course August 2nd.  "If we say the sun is standing still, then the sun is standing still." As if it were a rhetorical debate. Whatever. Next they'll be calling for defense department funding of prayer, so the faithful can pray that God will make all the hostile nations and groups go away. (1)
 In my Massachusetts high school in the 1970s, we had an elective course called "The Bible as Literature". Although i never took the course, i followed it closely. As near as i could tell, the instructor never implied anything in the bible was true. in fact, he got a lot of complaints from christian parents for discussing the book in the same way one would discuss any work of fiction. what seems clear to me in the texas situation, is that these wingnuts did what they always do: sell something palatable that masks their true agenda. these wingnuts would be outraged at a course such as the one offered in my high school, because it was exactly what they said they were going to offer: a non-sectarian look at the bible as history and literature. which is of course, never what they intended to offer in the first place. (1)
 the bible as "camp fire tales" is more like it. IMHO tribal-style oral histories are fine, until they're jotted them down and taken seriously. a significant thing, to me at least, is the heavy emphasis placed on the old testament as inerrant fact by the protestant religous right. by way of example, what motivates someone to even concern themself with proving as "fact" that the sun stood still some thousands of years ago? like what does it prove, one way or another? that their nonexistant god, really exists? campfire tales as an irrational beliefs delivery system, thats what that old testament is to me. campfire tales gone mad. (2)
The man famous for believing that reflective thought is a sign of weakness has made a pronouncement upon the validity of intelligent design:
(1)
If you haven't read this yet, and want a good laugh. I especially love the graph. (1)
The refuse to say who made everything. My belief is that these intelligent design people aren't really the Christians they pretend to be, but really extra-terrestrial nuts from Roswell who think that aliens created life on Earth. That could include the flying spaghetti monster. So Bobby already is covered. Kids in Texas are going to learn that we're descended from aliens. (1)
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