Poll: School District about to Get Sued

[Extraintrovert]

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. 6:6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.

Matthew 6:5-7

Even the Bible doesn't agree with the school. I'll enjoy watching Bastrop High School burn

It never ceases to amuse me how atheists know more about a religion than those that follow it. This quote should be printed onto pamphlets and handed to every Christian.

"It is our right to be allowed to pray wherever we choose."
"God doesn't exactly agree with you."

 

[Bags159]

Can we stop pretending the school isn't trying to make him pray? If they hold a prayer that you must attend, even if the actual praying is optional, it's pray or be damned. No one is going to want to out themselves in a school environment where you can get picked on for much less.

 

[soniceric]

Someone posted a video on youtube of the actual graduation, it happened last night.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYLpZIv8xFY

The school is not within its rights to do this!

 

[Char-Nobyl]

"...emotionally distressing on anyone who isn't a Christian?" Really? This kid is the worst kind of Atheist: the kind who hyperventilates at the thought that someone nearby might be thanking God on one of the biggest days of their lives.

1.) Live in Bible-Belt
2.) School assembles for prayer
3.) Every single student besides you is praying

At what point can this not lead to emotional distress?

At the point that you simply stand with everyone else and wait for the prayer to conclude. You don't need to say a thing. Hell, it's the same for the pledge of allegiance. If something prevents you from saying it, you simply stand out of respect for everyone else.

You know what's also emotionally distressing? Demanding that your Bible Belt school cut out every mention of "God" under the threat of legal action.

So he's a hero to you, even if he's hated by his community? And all because he was unreasonably demanding that his constitutional rights be followed to the letter rather than the spirit of the law? I can only imagine how ecstatic you get when WBC pickets military funerals. After all, they're reviled by the community, but they're celebrating freedom of speech. They must be heroes!

Using this logic we shouldn't enforce speed limits either because they're hated by the community.

...wait, what? Since when has general consensus been that speed limits are a bad idea?

Is there a rule like "godwin's law" for comparing someone trying to uphold the law to the WBC?

Most likely, yes, though in this case my issue was with your love for him as a result of him pursuing a goal that was almost universally reviled by those around him, and without any of the nobility that characterized similar efforts during the Civil Rights movement.

 

[emeraldrafael]

If its oka for the school to make you stand up and pledge allegiance to a flag of the country where you may just be there on visa, then they can be allowed to lead in a prayer. its not hurting atheists, and they're not forcing you I'm sure.

I dont see it mattering etiher way. Its a public tradition, I know my school did it, and we even had three different religions lead their prayers. if you were atheist, you were free to sit or stand quietly, just being respectful.

And besides all that, the kid lives int he bible belt. Thats not to say its a bad thing he's atheist, or that he shouldnt be, but what do he honestly expect to happen when you're school's mostly christian and you say you dont want to pray and that its wrong to after the school has been doing it.

 

[Char-Nobyl]

Student who complained is a dick. What did he/she/it expect when they called the superintendent and threatened to call the ACLU if the school didn't make changes to the graduation ceremony?

"...emotionally distressing on anyone who isn't a Christian?" Really? This kid is the worst kind of Atheist: the kind who hyperventilates at the thought that someone nearby might be thanking God on one of the biggest days of their lives.

This man is a hero.

Not because he got prayer taken out of a ceremony, but because he stood up for his constitutional right to be free from Religion.

You added two new letters there. It's freedom 'of' religion, not freedom 'from.' The kids aren't being forced to go to church the day of graduation.

Actually, it's more along the lines of "The government of the United States shall not make any law endorsing a particular religion..." Christian prayer in a government institution? Sounds like an endorsement to me.

That assumes that public schools are run by "government," which I assume are bland, blob-like entities that subsist on paperwork and taxes. Even public schools are run by local citizens, and thus are going to be inevitably colored by whatever region they're located in. 'The government' didn't think a prayer would be appropriate in the ceremony. Students and administrators did.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Absolutely agreed. People need to frikkin relax, whether they are Christian, Muslim, athiest, or whatever. Should prayer be required in public school? No. Should prayer be allowed? Why the hell not?

Private prayer by students is allowed.

Officially led prayer constitutes a violation of the establishment clause of the Constitution of the United States by implicitly raising the status of one religion over that of all others. It is therefore not allowed.

 

[Kopikatsu]

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. 6:6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.

Matthew 6:5-7

Even the Bible doesn't agree with the school. I'll enjoy watching Bastrop High School burn

It never ceases to amuse me how atheists know more about a religion than those that follow it. This quote should be printed onto pamphlets and handed to every Christian.

"It is our right to be allowed to pray wherever we choose."
"God doesn't exactly agree with you."

Hey, who said I was atheist? (I mean, I am, but I didn't say that.)

Anywho, that isn't what the verse says. It says that 'You can pray wherever you want, but if you do it in public, God basically sticks his fingers in his ears and goes 'LALALAIMNOTLISTENINGLALA', because praying in public makes you a vain asshole or something.

As for atheists knowing the bible better than some (possibly most) Christians is because...you just can't say 'RELIGION IS HERP A DERP', you have to study religion so you know exactly how to argue against it. (That being said, I only know about the Bible, not the Koran or anything.)

The Bible also says various other things, like how homosexual men who have sex will be struck with lightning, teenagers who don't obey their parents must be stoned in the middle of town in front of the chief/mayor (And not the happy kind of stoned), you should eat your children alive instead of let your city be invaded by heathens, God is totally cool with slavery, steel is stronger than God, and various other fun things!

I have to go to work now, but I can cite verses when I get back if needed.

 

[Char-Nobyl]

Seems fine to me.

I went to a Church of England Primary School, even though I'm pretty much agnostic now I can still pull most of the Lord's Prayer from memory.

Never messed me up.

Absolutely agreed. People need to frikkin relax, whether they are Christian, Muslim, athiest, or whatever. Should prayer be required in public school? No. Should prayer be allowed? Why the hell not?

Because Public schools are not allowed to endorse a single religion is that hard to understand?

Just because something happens doesn't mean it's being "endorse[d]." And hell, by that logic, expressly forbidding the practice of religion is an "endorse[ment]" of Atheism.

First of love you but that logic quote because there is no logic in your words. Yes the school is in the bible-belt of the U.S endorsing christian beliefs. Also following a secular world view does not expressly endorse Atheism, one can still be secular and believe in a higher power.

I'm...uhh...okay, I'll just say outright that I didn't understand a word of that. I think I got the gist of it, but look at it this way: there's a difference between not promoting a religion and demanding that all things resembling religion be removed from the premises. The former rings of 'secular,' while the latter rings of 'Atheism.'

 

[GloatingSwine]

That assumes that public schools are run by "government," which I assume are bland, blob-like entities that subsist on paperwork and taxes. Even public schools are run by local citizens, and thus are going to be inevitably colored by whatever region they're located in. 'The government' didn't think a prayer would be appropriate in the ceremony. Students and administrators did.

Administrators and staff of public schools are employees of the government, they are therefore bound by the state and federal constitutions. There is no way around this, what the school administration did was constitutionally wrong.

 

[Plurralbles]

Couldn't they get around all of htis headache by calling for a moment of silence?

A moment of quiet reflection, if you want to pray, pray, if you don't want to you can still appreciate this very important moment in the young peoples' lives.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Couldn't they get around all of htis headache by calling for a moment of silence?

They didn't want to get around it, they wanted a public Christian prayer with the official support and sanction of the school as an organisation.

 

[Char-Nobyl]

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. 6:6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.

Matthew 6:5-7

Even the Bible doesn't agree with the school. I'll enjoy watching Bastrop High School burn

It never ceases to amuse me how atheists know more about a religion than those that follow it. This quote should be printed onto pamphlets and handed to every Christian.

"It is our right to be allowed to pray wherever we choose."
"God doesn't exactly agree with you."

Erm...that's a fairly basic morality lesson. It's the entire premise of the "Who you are in the dark" thing. Public displays can be very different than how we conduct ourselves in private, but the passage was stating that what we do in private is far more important than what we do in public. It's not saying that prayer outside of our own homes is bad, but it's saying that it's pointless if we're only doing it to put on a show for our peers.

 

[Plurralbles]

Couldn't they get around all of htis headache by calling for a moment of silence?

They didn't want to get around it, they wanted a public Christian prayer with the official support and sanction of the school as an organisation.

Okay, that's nice- I was just stating that there could be a compromise reached instead of them getting sued into oblivion.

 

[mb16]

Seems fine to me.

I went to a Church of England Primary School, even though I'm pretty much agnostic now I can still pull most of the Lord's Prayer from memory.

Never messed me up.

Absolutely agreed. People need to frikkin relax, whether they are Christian, Muslim, athiest, or whatever. Should prayer be required in public school? No. Should prayer be allowed? Why the hell not?

Because Public schools are not allowed to endorse a single religion is that hard to understand?

Just because something happens doesn't mean it's being "endorse[d]." And hell, by that logic, expressly forbidding the practice of religion is an "endorse[ment]" of Atheism.

yes like not smoking is a habit

 

[Zantos]

So this guy complained about the prayer and the school did what it was constitutionally obliged to do by cancelling it. Now they're getting sued because one student exercised her right to freedom of religion? What?

I think the guy needs to get a life personally. I'm a christian studying among people who almost entirely atheist, and I just let it slide when I have to sit there and basically be insulted.

 

[soes757]

Even if you are atheist, it's not going to kill you. This shouldn't even be illegal.

Yes it should...

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

Yes, it's more than fine for them to do that. However, they must also cater to the prayer schedule of other religions too. You have to meet everyone's religious needs and wants if you intend to meet one of them.

 

[icaritos]

Separation of church and state exists for a reason so no, it is not ok to pray in school during a school sponsored event.