Imagine a public school teacher telling his/her students, “For the next few weeks, you’re all going to become Christians.” Imagine that students had to wear crosses, memorize Christian prayers and recite them, memorize Christian concepts of the Eucharist and celebrate them, fast during Lent and chant “Jesus is the Messiah!” How long would it take for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to file a lawsuit? A week? A day? A minute? As we’ve seen many times, it would be immediate and very expensive for the school district, which, when it lost, would be forced to pay huge legal fees to the ACLU.
In 2000, a seventh grade teacher in California’s Byron Union School District (about fifty miles east of San Francisco) forced her seventh-grade students to become Muslims for three weeks. Students had to wear a star and crescent, memorize Muslim prayers, verses and the five pillars of faith, fast during lunch period as if it were Ramadan, chant “Allah Akbar!” and play a dice game called “jihad,” which was defined for students as a “struggle against oppression.” What did the ACLU have to say about this? Nothing. Not a peep. Christian parents were outraged and filed a lawsuit in federal court against the school with the assistance of the Thomas More Law Center.
How might you respond to a project like this in your child's school?
- Quietly wait for it to end.
- Tell your school that your family is going to be on vacation for the next three weeks.
- Tell your school that your not happy about this, but allow your child to participate anyway.
- Tell your school that your child is not going to participate in this activity.
- Pull your child out of public school and tell them why, and let them know that you've had enough of this.
Come on now, answer honestly.
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