I can't find any details of the procedure, but we're still talking about the school approving - and therefore endorsing - speakers.
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Now It's Student Led Prayer at Football Games
- Thread starter Skwim
- Start date
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Probably something similar with our neighbors up north.
A Battle Over Prayer in Schools Tests Canada’s Multiculturalism
A bit of a different case:
- Canada does not have legal separation of church and state.
- the issues around Muslim prayers in public schools deal with how to accommodate Muslim students, not imposition of Muslim prayers on the entire student body.
I think you're right, although I suspect there'd be some variance depending on individual circumstance. I try not to think of the US as a parody of itself.
(not directing that at you...as someone on the other side of the world, too many people here reduce the entire country to the personality of the President, or some other cartoon description. My experience with Americans is much more nuanced, just like any nation, I guess!!)
Thanks...that was an interesting read.
I like the idea of allowing space for people to do what they need to, but not otherwise encouraging or supporting it (as a very short paraphrase) but the extremes on both sides seem to want to make points about any less than directive policy. So things like 'reasonable accommodations' becomes a battlefield over what people can do, rather than considering how they can compromise.
Tricky.
Shad
Veteran Member
Government actually funds religious organizations such as Catholic schools in Ontario. It is battle over the piece of the pie so to speak as government refuses to separate itself from involvement in religion. PC targets right-leaning Christians while Liberals, NDP and Greens target moderates, liberals and non-Christian religions for support.
At least their light emitting diode prayers are energy efficient.
The Peel Board’s approach is just one in a spectrum of approaches. In a lot of ways, it’s a response to what has happened elsewhere.
A school in Toronto also got into controversy when they allowed an imam to come in to lead Friday prayers: there were concerns about how the prayer services were being conducted and the content of the imam’s sermons. That school tried to wash its hands of the issue, saying that it wasn’t a concern of the school, since the school kids weren’t under school supervision while they were with the imam. Their excuse seemed ridiculous... and it seems that the school board in Peel agreed, since they tried to establish some ground rules for what is and isn’t acceptable during prayer time, and not allowing an outside imam into the school.
And the situation in Toronto was itself an attempt to fix the problems with another approach: originally, the school would just excuse the kids (with parental permission) and let them walk to a nearby mosque... but then many of the kids wouldn’t come back to school after.
The whole problem of how to handle Muslim prayer in school comes down to one thing: our institutions in Canada - like many western countries - have been built around Christian religious accommodation and virtually no thought has gone into accommodating other belief systems until very recently.
Similar problems would have arisen if Christians had to be excused from class to attend their worship services, but this is a non-issue because we’ve set up our school system so that school isn’t even in session on the days when mainstream Christians have religious obligations.
yes but you say promote religion, but i say express believes. and the schools are used every day for teaching and expressing what is believed to be true.
the government isn't to use public facilities to suppress expression either is it.
if a government or in this case a school official was doing as you say maybe, but if its a student that is not a government official, that student has the right to express what that student believes period.
that's like saying one shouldn't pray or express their beliefs in public parks and public streets unless you approve how they do it. good luck with that.
but it would be ok for some one to use it to say there is no God, correct? or in the name of science evolution is true, correct? but in the name of God, should be disallowed because that's what you think.
No, it wouldn't.
That would be weird at a football game, but in general, there's nothing wrong with schools teaching science to kids. It's a core part of their job, actually.
No, I think it was illegal where it happened.
I do think it's unethical to push religion on kids, but that's a separate issue.
No, it isn't. Christians at the game are perfectly free to pray on their own. Absolutely nothing would stop a Christian in the stands from praying to God by themselves as they see fit. A group of Christian's in the stands could even join hands and pray together if they all wanted to do it.
The problem arises when the school facilitates a sanctioned group prayer. And the school is still facilitating it even if it's being recited by a student.
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Back in the day the writers of the constitution just cut themselves off from a gov that had its own state sponsored religion which means there is no place for other religions. Catholics in those days and for quite some time later were denied the right to vote then. And the church of England was formed in response to the Vatican’s treatment of their queen at the time, which was also a church of the state. Freedom of religion in the constitution is intended to ensure that didn’t happen here in the US. The constitution isn’t intended to support freedom from religion, it is intended to support freedom of religion, by not forming a religion or church of the state. But the atheists came in the back door in the name of science and taught their own religion (system of belief), promoting that there is no God while maintaining the position of denial that they never said that. And gain support of this redefinition of the constitution, by giving that; don’t believe what it says, believe what we say it says. Same method used by the serpent in the garden.
To erase religious expression everywhere you don’t what it is the same as what the USSR enforced and Chairman Mao enforced. Both tried to eliminate all public expression of religion, and officially prompted that there was no God, and now the city of Leningrad is restored back to St. Petersburg with the churches have free expression and China maintains a church of the state, of which what ever is expressed in the church approved by the state surly can be expressed anywhere in China.
Again, the constitution is set to not have a church or religion of the state like Rome and England had or has. Which has nothing to do with what “the people” do with or at public property.
People will always seek to believe in a god whether it’s the True God or not, it’s in the nature and need of man, or it wouldn’t be so. You can not eliminate gods from man, because man is made to respond to his Maker. Even an atheist must believe he is from something even if its to believe they are the sons of monkeys, of which they are free to express anywhere.
that's all i got to say a boat that.
loganonekenobi
Member
On more than one occasion a new law was introduced that would allow religious displays on tax funded property such as the Oklahoma court house. All was well until the Satanist, Hindus, and Muslims wanted to put their display up as well. As predicted, the Christians lost their minds and the law was retracted. I'm okay with the idea of public displays of faith (or philosophy) as long as equality is truly observed. I have heard all manner of excuses made by the Christians as to why this should not be. The most prevalent one is the claim that America is a Christian nation. Just for the record I will say, culturally yes, legally no.
Skwim
Veteran Member
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
If I lived in Turkey, I would fully expect there to be Islamic prayers i the schools. It's an Islamic culture, even if it is a secular government.
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
Explain the difference between culturally Christian and legally Christian, and how that would influence things that happen in our everyday lives like prayer at football games.
Explain to me how you think you can have freedom of religion - i.e. the freedom to believe, worship, assemble, etc., as your religion dictates - without freedom from religion - i.e. being free from others who disagree with your religious beliefs trying to impose their religious beliefs on you.
Father Heathen
Veteran Member
And what does Turkey have to do with The U.S. and it's constitution?
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
It's analogous. Turkey has a secular government even though it is a Muslim country. The US has a secular government even though it is a Christian nation. Look, I'm Jewish, and it makes no sense to me to deny that the culture all around me is Christian. It is what it is.