Odessa Getting A Bible Class in Public School

[texastoast]

The school board in this West Texas town voted unanimously to add a Bible class to its high school curriculum.

Hundreds of people, most of them supporters of the proposal, packed the board meeting Tuesday night. More than 6,000 Odessa residents had signed a petition supporting the class.

. . .

"How can students understand Leonardo da Vinci's 'Last Supper' or Handel's 'Messiah' if they don't understand the reference from which they came?" Johnson said {Mike Johnson, a representative of the Greensboro, N.C.-based National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools}.

more . . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/27/AR2005042700407.html


Okay, okay, he's got a point. But shouldn't we carry that a little further, and question how can those same students understand the Bible class if they don't understand that so much of Christianity is based on the Old Religion? That the Creation Myth is really an old Babylonian creation myth with a new coat of paint?

That's it. I want a Wicca class too.

:P

[aquart]

1. Excellent.

May I suggest they start with Matthew 7:20 "Wherefore by their
fruits ye shall know them."

[neuvocat]

2. Hey, it helped to overthrow the catholics in Europe so why not?

[texastoast]

3. Oh, I see

You are suggesting that they have INTEGRITY in their faith. I'm afraid that will be a very new concept with some of these particular folks.

[Feli]

5. I assume it is an elective...

It would not bother me much, but isn't it a little excluding? Is the class on the Christian Bible, or other Bibles and/or religions as well?

[texastoast]

7. Exactly

If we are going to include religion in the public curriculum, then all religions must be included. They have set themselves up for someone from another religion to complain and here will come the ACLU (or it should). It is just a matter of time.

[CrispyQ]

4. If they want a Bible class, you should be able to have a Wicca class!

This wouldn't bother me so much if ALL religions were included. The students should be learning about all religions, not just their own.

I am getting scared that those of us who do not believe or do not believe the way they want us to are going to be forced to convert & if we resist, we'll be 'dealt with appropriately.'

:wtf: happened to my country?

[Nothing Without Hope]

6. Hey! I went to Odessa's Permian High School many years ago

Yes, that's the "Friday Night Lights" place, and high school football really was THE THING. Not a bad school back then, considering.

But really - a BIBLE class??? Taken as literature and as only ONE of the sacred texts of the world in a comparative literature/sociology class, fine if handled very carefully but worrisom because it could easily be NOT handled carefully. "Studying" only the Christian version of bible as the sole text is an OBVIOUS attempt to push one kind of religion in a public school. Outrageous!!!

Clearly, they think that since they can outvote the Jews and Muslims and Buddhists and atheists and.... in their district, they can teach religion in the public school. That's what this is, a coup to disenfranchise everyone but their own powerful clique.

Why can'y they "teach" this class in their own lavishly funded churches' Sunday Schools? That's what they're FOR.

[hedda_foil]

8. Exactly!

The Bible as literature in a historical/sociological and artistic context is one thing (and not a whole course at that!). This sounds like another thing entirely.

[texastoast]

9. Ah, football

That's the real religion, and it was far more important than good grades when I lived there. Thus, you ended up with a lot of kids like Don Billingsley and his drunk dad Charlie from the movie.

[Nothing Without Hope]

11. Wow, YOU liived in Odessa TOO?? I haven't been back in decades.

Haven't missed it either. I enjoy visiting Austin and San Antonio, but not Odessa. Depressing place, nothing to do, no mountains, no rivers, no natural trees (I don't count chin-high mequite scrub), only scorpions and sand storms. No wonder high school football was EVERYTHING.

[texastoast]

14. Football, the bars, and the churches

Odessa did have some good honky-tonks and some of the best dancers I have ever come across. It was surreal. God and Country but only after Friday nights of gridiron rumbles and Saturday nights of Budweiser and Harvey Wallbangers.

Great sunsets, though.

[Nothing Without Hope]

16. You're right about the sunsets. I never went to an Odessa bar because

I left after Permian High School and a year at Odessa Junior College. I visited my parents from time to time after that, but I never did see an Odessa honky-tonk. Yes, the night skies were wonderful and there was always a breeze and an electrical storm in the distance, visible because of the extreme flatness and lack of mature trees. Didn't like the place at all during the day, but the sunsets and the nights were OK. I did enjoy the excitement of the football when I was in high school. The team spirit leading up to the Friday night games was overwhelming. I was a studious, quiet little thing, but I yelled myself hoarse with all the rest.

Haven't been back in a long, long time. Hear it went downhill when there was a downturn in the oil industry a couple decades ago.

[BR_Parkway]

10. Not even the Muslims and the Jews, how are they going to teach

about Jesus making wine from water without a big scream from either the Baptists or the Methodists?

[Nothing Without Hope]

12. Good point. Goes to show what happens when a bunch of fools meet and

think they can decide the rules for everyone and ignore laws and common sense. What hubris - they excuse their behavior by telling themselves their god wants them to do this. "By their fruits you shall know them," indeed.

[yellowdogintexas]

17. newsflash, Methodists teach the Cana Wedding story so we

know about the wine...and joke about it quite a lot in the context of the Welch's grape juice Communion "wine"...

Methodists aren't exactly teetotalers any more...ministers have been allowed to 'gasp' partake of alcohol in moderation for about 20 years, maybe longer.

[texastoast]

21. Right. Now about those Baptists . . .

My neighborhood is full of Baptist churches. My kid goes to school with mostly Baptist kids and is on sports teams with them. Being a compassionate Methodist, I just pretend that I don't see all my son's friends' parents in the liquor store so they don't feel so uncomfortable. NOT. I wave and say hello.:7

[yellowdogintexas]

22. you mean they recognize you in the liquour store?

Compassionate Methodist, where do you live?

[BrightKnight]

13. A comparative religion elective class might be useful

Only teaching the Bible sounds like Sunday school. People should not be forced to attend Sunday School.

[texastoast]

15. Comparative religion would be great

Religion is an absolutely fascinating study of how our thinking is affected by it. But any study needs to be broad-based and inclusive. That's the problem I have with this "Bible" class.

[yellowdogintexas]

18. Comparative Religion as an elective is great. In the Louisville

KY schools, they used to have an honors course called
"Humanities" which covered Greek, Roman, and other mythologies, history of world religions, arts, literature, etc.

I was always jealous that it wasn't offered in my small rural high school

[johncoby2]

19. Grest. Maybe they will read the damn thing for once. EOM

[texastoast]

20. LOL!

Point!

[DesEtoiles]

23. Is it legal to use public funds to pay for this? Sounds like a lawsuit...

[Why Syzygy]

24. What's to UNDERSTAND?

Leonardo da Vinci's 'Last Supper' or Handel's 'Messiah'

They are works of ART. No theology lesson needed.

Do they still teach Greek mythology?