[extropy-chat] Atheists launch inquisition...

Hal Finney hal at finney.org
Thu Nov 25 17:54:46 UTC 2004


Keep in mind that we're only getting one side of the story here.
The main source for the article is the lawyer of the teacher who is suing.
The school administration is not talking, which is a common bureaucratic
response when threatened with a lawsuit.

Reading between the lines, I get the impression that this teacher has
been pushing his Christianity on the students, and probably some have
complained, otherwise it would never have come to the attention of
the administration.  He may be providing selective quotes from historic
documents which over-emphasize the religious and Christian influence on
early American history.  As Samantha pointed out, a number of our Founding
Fathers were deists rather than Christians.  Deism was a philosophy which
acknowledged God as the creator of the universe and founder of natural
law, but which rejected miraculous and superstitious explanations of
physical events in favor of reason and science.  Jefferson in particular
created a re-written version of the Bible which removed Jesus' miraculous
doings but preserved his moral and ethical instructions, which were seen
as wise and well-founded.

If the teacher is allowing his religious beliefs to sway his presentation
of American history in a biased and unbalanced manner, then it is proper
for the administration to step in and try to rectify the situation.
Making the teacher run his instructional materials by the principle for
approval is a drastic step, but it is better than giving the students
a false impression of historical facts.

Hal



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