{"id":443,"date":"2003-04-14T12:29:38","date_gmt":"2003-04-14T17:29:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=443"},"modified":"2003-04-14T12:29:38","modified_gmt":"2003-04-14T17:29:38","slug":"oil_and_water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/04\/14\/oil_and_water.html","title":{"rendered":"Oil and water"},"content":{"rendered":"

While Scott <\/a>and I seem to be on different planets regarding Iraq, we can both <\/a>heartily agree that this story<\/a> is disturbing<\/p>\n

India, her older siblings, Tyla and Garrett, and their mother, Sarajane, described how years of alleged verbal taunts, veiled threats and then finally physical abuse over their religious differences with other Union County residents prompted them to pull India from Horace Maynard Middle School in 2002. <\/p>\n

“The last straw was when India was chased down the hallway by three boys who grabbed her by the back of the neck and told her she should change her religion or they’d change it for her,” said Sarajane Tracy.<\/p>\n

But it’s not just a matter of intolerant students being given free rein by the school district to terrorize a pagan girl. While I think the scrubbing of cultural <\/i>religious symbols from public fora has gone more than a bit overboard, these passages demonstrate just why that’s happened.<\/p>\n

India’s older sister, Tyla, a student at Union County High School, said she was once punished for not attending a tent revival held during school hours by being forced to do extra classwork. “(My teacher) told me it would remind me to bring my permission slip,” Tyla said. <\/p>\n

The tent revival, called the Area Wide Crusade, was started in 1998 by a Union County Baptist pastor and is slated to be held again later this month. <\/p>\n

According to the Tracys, India was sent to the principal’s office twice because of her religion. The first time was triggered by her mother’s refusal of permission for her to attend the revival. The second visit took place when she declined to play Mary in a Christmas play.<\/p>\n

Tent revivals as school events (requiring a permission slip and hanging out in the principal’s office)? And, for that matter, a Christmas Pageant complete with the Virgin Mary, also a school function?<\/p>\n

Of course, we don’t know the whole story, since the district isn’t talking (they never do, do they).<\/p>\n

But, to put it bluntly, school is not church. I don’t care if 99.9% of the local population is as Christian as Billy Graham — heck, I don’t care if they’re 100% churchgoers, you are asking for trouble, intolerance, and an inevitable clash if you incorporate denominational activities into your school curriculum. <\/p>\n

Unfortunately, it usually takes a case like this — ostracism, threats, a law suit, and, inevitably, a big cash pay-out — to start to get districts like this in line. And, even then, it’s problematic.<\/p>\n

Perhaps someone ought to teach a civics lesson there on the subject. They can start with the Tennessee state constitution, Article I, Section 3:<\/p>\n

Section 3. That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own conscience; that no man can of right be compelled to attend, erect, or support any place of worship, or to maintain any minister against his consent; that no human authority can, in any case whatever, control or interfere with the rights of conscience; and that no preference shall ever be given, by law, to any religious establishment or mode of worship.<\/p>\n

Pretty to think so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While Scott and I seem to be on different planets regarding Iraq, we can both heartily agree that this story is disturbing India, her older siblings, Tyla and Garrett, and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-zt-pc"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":9007,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/03\/06\/the_planets.html","url_meta":{"origin":443,"position":0},"title":"The Planets","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 6-Mar-06 3:45pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Okay, this is actually pretty cool. 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