A federal appeals court in St. Louis heard arguments Thursday in a case involving the distribution of Gideon Bibles to children in public schools.
The South Iron R-1 School District formerly had a policy that allowed outside religious groups to distribute Bibles to fifth graders during the school day.
The policy prompted a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union, which sued the district in September 2006, demanding a stop to the distribution.
Catherine D. Perry, a lower federal court judge, ordered a halt to the Bible distribution, calling it "an instrument of religion."
Following the order, the district then adopted a written equal access policy that treats the distribution of secular and religious literature outside of class on an equal basis. Under the new policy, outside groups could apply to distribute literature from stationary tables in two designated locations but were prohibited from distributing material inside classrooms.
Mathew D. Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel, who represents the school district in the case, asked the appeals court Thursday to reverse the ruling.
"The Bible cannot be singled out for special penalties like contraband. How ironic that in America, until recent times, the Bible formed the basis of education, and now its mere presence is radioactive in the opinion of some judges," said Staver in a statement.
"The Founders never envisioned such open hostility toward the Christian religion as we see today in some venues. To single out the Bible alone for discriminatory treatment harkens back to the Dark Ages. America deserves better. Our Constitution should be respected, not disregarded."
At issue during the hearing was whether the permanent injunction entered by Perry was based on the revised policy or the former policy.
Staver argued before the court that the permanent injunction did not take the new policy into appropriate consideration.
"It would be inappropriate for this previous injunction based upon a specific incident to literally gut the public forum and single out one single piece of literature...namely the Bible," stated Staver.
The court is expected to issue a decision in a few months.
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sorry to be so late jumping in on this but as an educator who has dealt directly with this issue I thought maybe I could add something. It is clear that based on previous supreme court rulings this school was out of line in permitting the distribution on school grounds. Hopefully instead of spending resources on fruitless law suits making the school into an ideological battleground they will move on to this to some real solutions. For example when I faced a similar situation several years ago I explained calmly to the Gideons that I could not permit on school distribution of testaments. I went on to explain clearly and distinctly the specific extent and limits of the constitutional issue involved and how it applied. I then went on "by the way" to inform the representative of our schools upcoming field trip schedule including times and locations. Which was incidentally public information. Unsurprisingly we discovered that at several of the non governmental field trip sites (state fair amongst others) there were tables of testaments with signs indicating they were free for the taking. At the end of the year the representative spoke to me again and let me know that based on reports the take up of testaments was much better than when they had distributed them at school in the past.
And guess what absolutely ok by the ACLU.
Zeno,
My children are in their 30's and 40's they watch what ever they want. If I were raising children today I wouldn't have a tv.
Daniel said: "a star exploding is a mini big bang."
No it isn't! They are completely different things. As I said, go and read up about 101 cosmology. Wikipedia will do.
"cosmology"
What does hair styling have to do with anything?
No really, a star exploding is a mini big bang. According to the teachers I had in high school, the big bang was stellar matter colapsing and then exploding forming the universe. I just check Wikipedia. Quite interesting. I speaks about everything in the universe moving away from a central point as the result of an explosion of condensed matter. Still, sounds like an exploding star to me.
"Methodist, Episcopal, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Catholic, Northern and Southern Baptist, Church of Christ, Assembly of God, etc. have all departed from God. Most well-known preachers (Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, etc.) have departed from God, and disassociated themselves with pure Gospel preaching."
-- "Churches," WBC "Godhatesamerica.com" Web site
"Like the Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Methodists, et al., the so-called Christian Church-Disciples of Christ (generally, Congregational Churches) are sodomite churches. They are not true churches of Jesus Christ."
-- "Filthy Fags Own Australia," WBC "News Release,"
October 14, 1996
I'd say he doesn't think I'm a Christian so I assume it's safe to say by my belief that I have no need to consider him a Christian. In fact, his church has all the tell tale signs of a cult. Phelps lacks any sign of Biblical humility whatsoever. The Apostle Paul said he was a chief of sinners. Except for the grace of God it would be Phelps who would be in the sin he 'preaches' about. This is why I am willing to be a part of this blog site. I know what my relationship with God is like and I want others to share in that grace.
Not all who say on that day 'Lord, Lord' shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Daniel said: "I don't know of any Christians who have said that athiests, agnostics, gays or any other group should be jailed or killed."
Well, for one: http://www.godhatesfags.com/visual/photos/deathpenaltyforfags.jpg from the Westboro Baptist church. Phelps is a Christian, isn't he?
Daniel said: "Here's a question. If a star explodes an forms a black hole...why does it pull matter in instead of spew it out? (If the big bang is true it would bang out and not in.)"
What on earth makes you think a black hole is the same thing as the big bang? I suggest you read up on cosmology.
shooter38 said: "Kids get to see violence,sex,incest,injustice and dangerous myths every time they turn on the tv. So maybe we should get rid of those too."
What kind of TV programmes do you let your kids watch?
Huron wrote: "Once again evolution is the study of how life evolved not how it originated."
Must be my bad. I thought it was called ORIGIN of species. This would indicate it explained the ORIGIN of each species including the first one.
Here's a question. If a star explodes an forms a black hole...why does it pull matter in instead of spew it out? (If the big bang is true it would bang out and not in.)
"Having a privileged status is unconstitutional and the loss of privilege does not mean persecution but equality."
The name for that type of 'equality' is called communism. The founding fathers founded this country so each person could be free to practice whatever faith they wanted which was something they didn't have in England. If you were not a part of the Church of England then you were a heritic and the consequences were grave.
I don't know of any Christians who have said that athiests, agnostics, gays or any other group should be jailed or killed. Still, we have the right to live here and not have our religion interferred with. Laws with disrespect a particular faith violate the Freedom of Religion clause and replace it with communism. Why do I say that? Simple, either you conform or you suffer. Case and point the photographer in AZ...the doctor in CA...the list goes on. Eventually everyone will lose and be forced to believe the same thing in the name of 'fairness'. Mark this day on your calendar and remember I told you this.
Huron wrote: "Once again evolution is the study of how life evolved not how it originated."
If this is true, why isn't this taught during evolution class? Why is it not stressed that although evolution does research how life evolves, it does not explain how life began?
"The bible, with its violence, sex, incest, injustice and dangerous myths should be kept well away from children."
And so isn't 3/4 of the books on any given school shelf. Can we remove them as well?
"Why is it when the christian religion is treated like other belief systems christians decry it as being singled out or as persecution?"
That would be because the Anti-Christ Legal Union isn't taking any other religion to court. Being singled out does give the impression of being singled out....
"Once again taxpayer money is being wasted because Christian theocrats have no respect for our constitution."
You Bibliophobia is showing. There are no taxpayer dollars being expended here. In this case there are not even extra lights turned on for these guys! The school is giving equal access so where's the constitutional issue?
The Bible has been deemed a historic document by the Courts has it not? Trying to stop the handing out of a free copy of an American historic document is just Bibliophobia prejudice in the name of "civil liberties". Leave it to the Anti-Christ Legal Union to bring a case like this.
Why is it when the christian religion is treated like other belief systems christians decry it as being singled out or as persecution? Having a privileged status is unconstitutional and the loss of privilege does not mean persecution but equality. Something christians have a hard time understanding at times. Once again evolution is the study of how life evolved not how it originated. That is Abiogenesis. It is true that science can not step infinately far back in time to say where we ultimately came from. It is not that we can not stand to hear other people say they have an answer it's just when catholics, protestants, mormons, sunni, shia, hindu, etc claim they have one and it's unjustifiable then we as evidence driven people are obligated to state the emperor has no clothes.
"Kids get to see violence,sex,incest,injustice and dangerous myths every time they turn on the tv. So maybe we should get rid of those too. "
You got that right. If you took off violence, injustice and dangerous myths (like people can fly and then some 7 year old jumps off a building) even in cartoon form we wouldn't have much 'kid' TV and only half the commercials! Let's not discriminate. Let's take it all out. My son is split between k-5 and grade 1. His history stuff already has some questionable stuff in it for his age. Until science can prove how life came from non-life the myth of evolution should be removed too. Let's not discriminate. If you can't prove it teaching children they came from apes only encourages them to act like it. We can't have this 'dangerous evolution myth' being taught to middle school children who already have behavioral issues!!!
"with its violence, sex, incest, injustice and dangerous myths "
Being in the UK you have never seen one of our school libraries! If you removed books based on your criterion we would have quite a bit of space on the shelves!!! Then we would have lawsuits over freedom of speach.
What a tangled web we weave...
pro-science: Once again, taxpayer money is being wasted because Darwinists cannot explain how life sprang from non-life; how everything sprang from nothing, where our human moral code came from, and they can't STAND that someone else has the answer!
Zeno,
Kids get to see violence,sex,incest,injustice and dangerous myths every time they turn on the tv. So maybe we should get rid of those too.
The bible, with its violence, sex, incest, injustice and dangerous myths should be kept well away from children.
"Staver argued before the court that the permanent injunction did not take the new policy into appropriate consideration. "
If they are not discriminating against any equal access then so be it. There are treating everyone the same.