Sandy Hook and religion
As a very traditional Baptist, I'm dismayed that so many religious leaders keep touting this concept that if only we forced Jewish and Hindu students to pray Christian prayers that they don't believe in then mass murders wouldn't happen. Freedom doesn't work that way, the soul doesn't work that way, and — for heaven's sake — God doesn't work that way.
If we pray as Christ instructed us — alone, with the door shut — no law could be passed to stop us. It's only the public prayers over taxpayer-funded microphones, prayed into the ears of individuals of different consciences (even different Christians) that can, and must, be left to theocracies and states with state religions and other places where government and religion are in bed with each other, to the great damage of each.
In the past week, we've seen an insidious climax to the years-long suggestion from evangelicals (even, alas, Baptists who don't know their history) that the nature of God is to petulantly withdraw when He doesn't feel honored enough. What vision of God is this? Can religious figures such as Mike Huckabee really believe it's possible for God to be "marched out of the public square?" Are we now idolaters? Why do we then act as if removing a nativity statue removes the presence of God?
No. God was there, God is there, God is here, and He reigns, and — alas — He allows stuff like this to happen. All the pompous friends-of-Job we've been hearing the past few days are enlightening us about nothing but their own bilious, spiteful selves when they say that the reason innocent 7-year-old bystanders died in a storm of bullets was because they weren't forced to say the Lord's Prayer before geometry, or that Christians are somehow the only people who could ever teach "Thou shalt not kill."
The ironic thing (beyond the phenomenon of Baptists, who invented separation of church and state, now calling for their conflation) is that many of these outspoken people who say that God can be removed from schools by human will are the same people who hammer away at how much they hate government, and how government can do nothing right, and how they want government to stay out of our business and stop meddling — right up until they say that government-run schools should be teaching about God and morality.
I've seen what the school cafeteria does to spinach; I have no desire to see it serving up religion. We've had enough of public schools trying to teach morality and values and feelings — how about if they go back to teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic, and I'll teach my kids our family's religious values. And let's please find another way, a logical way, to discuss how America, the most religiously observant country in the world, can stop being so violent.
If we pray as Christ instructed us — alone, with the door shut — no law could be passed to stop us. It's only the public prayers over taxpayer-funded microphones, prayed into the ears of individuals of different consciences (even different Christians) that can, and must, be left to theocracies and states with state religions and other places where government and religion are in bed with each other, to the great damage of each.
In the past week, we've seen an insidious climax to the years-long suggestion from evangelicals (even, alas, Baptists who don't know their history) that the nature of God is to petulantly withdraw when He doesn't feel honored enough. What vision of God is this? Can religious figures such as Mike Huckabee really believe it's possible for God to be "marched out of the public square?" Are we now idolaters? Why do we then act as if removing a nativity statue removes the presence of God?
No. God was there, God is there, God is here, and He reigns, and — alas — He allows stuff like this to happen. All the pompous friends-of-Job we've been hearing the past few days are enlightening us about nothing but their own bilious, spiteful selves when they say that the reason innocent 7-year-old bystanders died in a storm of bullets was because they weren't forced to say the Lord's Prayer before geometry, or that Christians are somehow the only people who could ever teach "Thou shalt not kill."
The ironic thing (beyond the phenomenon of Baptists, who invented separation of church and state, now calling for their conflation) is that many of these outspoken people who say that God can be removed from schools by human will are the same people who hammer away at how much they hate government, and how government can do nothing right, and how they want government to stay out of our business and stop meddling — right up until they say that government-run schools should be teaching about God and morality.
I've seen what the school cafeteria does to spinach; I have no desire to see it serving up religion. We've had enough of public schools trying to teach morality and values and feelings — how about if they go back to teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic, and I'll teach my kids our family's religious values. And let's please find another way, a logical way, to discuss how America, the most religiously observant country in the world, can stop being so violent.
Comments
I don't think sanctioning prayer in schools is the answer, just like I don't think posting a "gunmen keep out" sign is the answer, but I do think we need to take a hard look at the way we have de-community-i-fied our schools, probably inadvertently.
Certainly the placid suburban town of Sandy Hook is hardly an example of hopeless modern anomie.
If, however, our schools are to be part of the community, the last thing I'd recommend is a movement toward "set apart"ness. Those seem to be two different things. Perhaps what I really need is a more in-depth explanation from you about what you mean by both terms.
Meanwhile, "replacing moral instruction with amoral instruction" is, I'm afraid, a drastic misdiagnosis. I suggest "replacing education in reading, history, science, art, math, and writing with attempts at moral instruction" is more accurate.
>Schools without a moral center do not engender attachment the way schools with one do.
>If schools had more of a moral center, more people would view them in a more "holy" way, and direct their anger/unhappiness at other institutions.
On the front end, you could say this happened when we "took prayer out of schools."
Would it have prevented Sandy Hook? Like I posted on my cousin's status - the only thing that would have prevented Sandy Hook is if the shooter had not pulled the trigger.
Again, I'm not espousing this position... just trying to shed some light on the emotional argument.
And, the other thing is that I hope that we don't focus so much on one area, whether that's morality, guns, mental health, community, security, the role of the church, prayer or whatever, that we forgo an improvement in all the others.