FredFlash wrote: I did 18 months in the U. S. Army as a paratrooper.
Military always recognizes military. LOl. Tough job, you have my respect.
I guess if you teach math, God may not come up that often.
Well, I don't have it as bad as the Science teachers trying to teach evolution. But tryng to teach children about a mathematically ordered Universe without mentioning the fact that there is a pattern is kind of hard. Galeleo Gallelei said, "Mathematics is the alphabet in which God wrote the Universe," and he wasn't kidding.
But "don't mention God" is a bit harsh. I am gonna guess that the administrator;s primary concern is to avoid lawsuits.
Freakin' A! Our district got sued for 3 million, thanks to a zealot. People don't realize that the money we hd to pay the crackpot took away money from their children. People these days think sueing someone is a way to get ahead and make easy money. They don't understand the impact it has on our society.
What would happen if a teacher in your school claimed that he coud not, as an agent of the government and because of his religious sentiment that God ruled the conscience of man, attempt to influence his student's opinions regarding their duties to God by recommending the pledge of allegiance with its affimation of belief in God?
No big deal, all teachers have that option in their own classrooms. But you can bet that being in the Bible belt, it would make the front page of the paper. Where upon the poor teacher would be vilified in the community as an "atheist."
People have no idea what it is like to be a teacher these days.
:o
Separation of Church and State?
Separation of Church and State?
All the world's a stage and the men and women merely players...Shakespeare
Separation of Church and State?
Jives wrote: On the other hand, I had to fire a teacher once who was heard saying to her class, "OK, so we all agree that Satan exists, that we are servants of Satan, and that we are all sinners..."
This sword cuts both ways. You don't want to excise religion out of society totally, but you also don't want people teaching their "version" of religion to other's children.:-2
James Madison defined the word "religion" in the First Amednemt to mean "the duty which we owe to the Creator." The duty we owe Satan is not "religion" under Madison's view of the establishment clause. Therefore, the teacher's actions may not have been violation of Madison's doctrine as "an establisment of religion"; but it would have been an act respecting religion in the sense that a person who believe he has duties to Satan would most likely have none to the Creator.
Fred
This sword cuts both ways. You don't want to excise religion out of society totally, but you also don't want people teaching their "version" of religion to other's children.:-2
James Madison defined the word "religion" in the First Amednemt to mean "the duty which we owe to the Creator." The duty we owe Satan is not "religion" under Madison's view of the establishment clause. Therefore, the teacher's actions may not have been violation of Madison's doctrine as "an establisment of religion"; but it would have been an act respecting religion in the sense that a person who believe he has duties to Satan would most likely have none to the Creator.
Fred
Separation of Church and State?
Jives wrote: Military always recognizes military. LOl. Tough job, you have my respect.
Well, I don't have it as bad as the Science teachers trying to teach evolution. But tryng to teach children about a mathematically ordered Universe without mentioning the fact that there is a pattern is kind of hard. Galeleo Gallelei said, "Mathematics is the alphabet in which God wrote the Universe," and he wasn't kidding.....................Freakin' A! Our district got sued for 3 million, thanks to a zealot. People don't realize that the money we hd to pay the crackpot took away money from their children. People these days think sueing someone is a way to get ahead and make easy money. They don't understand the impact it has on our society..................No big deal, all teachers have that option in their own classrooms. But you can bet that being in the Bible belt, it would make the front page of the paper. Where upon the poor teacher would be vilified in the community as an "atheist."..........People have no idea what it is like to be a teacher these days.
What kind of zealot sued the district? Was it a church state issue? What was the beef?
There is a dispute I know of in the Dallas area where a parent claims a violation of the establishment clause by the school's exclusion of her child, on religious grounds, from participating in the patriotic exercise of reciting the pledge with his fellow students . His religion does not permit him, as it did not permit Isaac Backus a many Baptists during the founding era, to do something suggested by the government that implies civil authority over his duties to the Creator.
The principal asked the boy why, if he believed in God, why he was offended by the teachers recommendation to say the pledge, The boy then asked the principal if Eve should have been offended when Satan, in the guise of a serpent, gave her religious advice. The boy points out that Satan/Serpent actually gave Eve truthful advice. Therefore, the test is not whether the religious advice is true, the test is does the religious advice come from God. The answer is of couse, no. The advice comes from the government.
The boy's religion is "Primitive Bapstist-Methodism."
Fred
Well, I don't have it as bad as the Science teachers trying to teach evolution. But tryng to teach children about a mathematically ordered Universe without mentioning the fact that there is a pattern is kind of hard. Galeleo Gallelei said, "Mathematics is the alphabet in which God wrote the Universe," and he wasn't kidding.....................Freakin' A! Our district got sued for 3 million, thanks to a zealot. People don't realize that the money we hd to pay the crackpot took away money from their children. People these days think sueing someone is a way to get ahead and make easy money. They don't understand the impact it has on our society..................No big deal, all teachers have that option in their own classrooms. But you can bet that being in the Bible belt, it would make the front page of the paper. Where upon the poor teacher would be vilified in the community as an "atheist."..........People have no idea what it is like to be a teacher these days.
What kind of zealot sued the district? Was it a church state issue? What was the beef?
There is a dispute I know of in the Dallas area where a parent claims a violation of the establishment clause by the school's exclusion of her child, on religious grounds, from participating in the patriotic exercise of reciting the pledge with his fellow students . His religion does not permit him, as it did not permit Isaac Backus a many Baptists during the founding era, to do something suggested by the government that implies civil authority over his duties to the Creator.
The principal asked the boy why, if he believed in God, why he was offended by the teachers recommendation to say the pledge, The boy then asked the principal if Eve should have been offended when Satan, in the guise of a serpent, gave her religious advice. The boy points out that Satan/Serpent actually gave Eve truthful advice. Therefore, the test is not whether the religious advice is true, the test is does the religious advice come from God. The answer is of couse, no. The advice comes from the government.
The boy's religion is "Primitive Bapstist-Methodism."
Fred
Separation of Church and State?
ChiptBeef wrote: It's constitutional for the Senate and House Chaplains to pray, but it's unconstitutional for students to hear the prayer. :-5 Chipper, this thread is now in its 20-somethingth screen. Way back on screen 2 I pointed out:Bronwen wrote: The difference is that government officials are adults, old enough, hopefully, to have formed their own ideas about their religious preferences. Nor are the prayers in government buildings particularly sectarian. They are usually led by a rotation of clergymen of various faiths, each attempting to make his/her invocation as non-denominational as possible. These prayers are, in fact, a tribute to the USA's history of religious freedom and tolerance.
Schools are a different thing entirely. Here the possibility of proselytizing is overwhelming, almost unavoidable. Many attempts have been made to write a universally acceptable prayer, always with negative, sometimes even laughable, results. It's just not possible. Let the kids pray privately or send them to a church-affiliated school.I wouldn't change a word. You are indeed, like your smiley, busting your brain against a brick wall, a THICK brick wall. What is there about that that you don't understand? But more important, court decisions aside, if you had the power, as, say, a school principal, what would YOU do differently? I keep asking and you and the others of your stripe never answer. Would you start each day with a mandated prayer? What kind of prayer? Protestant? Catholic? Jewish? Muslim? How about Bible reading? Which Bible would you use? Whatever your answer, what about all of the students and parents who would object?
How about a straight answer for once?
Schools are a different thing entirely. Here the possibility of proselytizing is overwhelming, almost unavoidable. Many attempts have been made to write a universally acceptable prayer, always with negative, sometimes even laughable, results. It's just not possible. Let the kids pray privately or send them to a church-affiliated school.I wouldn't change a word. You are indeed, like your smiley, busting your brain against a brick wall, a THICK brick wall. What is there about that that you don't understand? But more important, court decisions aside, if you had the power, as, say, a school principal, what would YOU do differently? I keep asking and you and the others of your stripe never answer. Would you start each day with a mandated prayer? What kind of prayer? Protestant? Catholic? Jewish? Muslim? How about Bible reading? Which Bible would you use? Whatever your answer, what about all of the students and parents who would object?
How about a straight answer for once?
Separation of Church and State?
I have investigated the claims of Chief Justice Warren Burger regarding the compensation of the Chaplains to the the First U. S. Congress, and the opening of daily assemblies of the U. S. Senate and House of Representative with prayers by Chaplains to the First U. S. Congress (1789 - 1791).
I became curious regarding Congressional/Legislative Prayer after reading some prayers said at the Texas Constitutional Convention of 1845. I wanted to read some the prayers read during the First U. S. Congress (1789-1791).
I availed myself of the U. S. Congressional Documents and Debates (1774 – 1875) Collection available on line at the Library of Congress web site to search for the “prayers to open each session†referred to by Justice Burger. I searched for days without finding one single prayer recorded in the official records of the First U. S. Congress.
I examined the records for the 141 days the House met in 1789 and the 141 days the House met. I checked the House Journal and that of the Senate. I also checked the Annals of Congress. I did not find any evidence of opening prayers.
I backtracked and closely examined the documents/evidence cited by Chief Justice Warren Burger in Marsh v. Chambers (1993) and discovered that the evidence he cited does not support his claim that the two Chaplains to Congress were to open each daily session with prayer. The evidence cited shows only that the two Chaplains were selected and to be paid at a rate of $500.00 per year. The evidence says nothing about the Chaplains opening each daily session with prayers.
It turns out that the Chaplains were paid “at a rate of†$500 per year. Since Congress, in a typical year, met for only six months, the Chaplains were paid only $250 per year. The Appropriations Bill for 1793 shows that a Chaplain to Congress was only budgeted to be paid $250 per year. In the 1797 budget their pay was projected to be only $166.67 for four months.
Justice Burger claimed that the Chaplain’s pay compared favorably with that of the Congressmen. However, this claim is false.
A Congressman was, as projected in the 1793 Appropriations Bill, to be paid $1,033 a year, which does not compare favorably to the estimate of $250 a year for a Chaplain to Congress. A Chaplain to Congress was the lowest paid position on the Congressional Civil List and did not really compare favorably to that of the Assistant Doorkeepers or the Engrossing Clerks. Presented below are the estimates in the 1793 budget for the pay of Congressional Officers and Employees on the Civil List.
Office or Position - Budgeted Pay
Speaker of the House $1,428.00
Congressman $1,033.00
Secretary of the Senate $1,865.00
Clerk of the House of Representatives $1,635.00
Principal clerk to the Secretary of the Senate $547 50
Principal clerk to the Clerk of the House $547.50
Sergeant-at-arms of the House $760.00
Doorkeeper of the House of Representatives$ 500.00
Assistant Doorkeeper of the House $450.00
Engrossing clerk of the House $365.00
Chaplain to the Senate $250.00
Chaplain to the House $250.00
I found no resolution in the records of House or Senate of the First Congress establishing a requirement for daily opening prayers; no record that such a duty was ever assigned to the Chaplains; and no record whatsoever of prayers being read to open any daily assembly.
Prayers in Continental Congress (1774 – 1789) were performed one day a year from 1774 to 1784 except for a brief twenty-eight day period in 1777 when prayers were read daily. Prayer in the Continental Congress was always preceded by a formal resolution for prayer and the prayers so ordered were recorded in the daily journal on the day they were said. Interestingly, the establishment of the Continental Congress Chaplain was discontinued on March 5, 1784. There were no prayers whatsoever from 1784 to 1789.
The rules established by the House and Senate of the First U. s. Congress contain detailed assignments of duties and responsibilities for the all of the Congressional employees on the "Civil List", except that the Chaplains are not even mentioned. The only assignment ever conferred by the First Congress on the Chaplains was to a perform a prayer service for the President, the Vice-President and the members of Congress after the oath of office had been administered to the President on April 30, 1789.
One might reasonably conclude that the First U. S. Congress thought it best not to hold a religious service in the Chamber of the Senate where the President’s swearing in ceremony took place. Congress adjourned (perhaps to divest the Congressmen of their civil authority to legislate) and proceeded as regular citizens (not as government officials) to St. Paul's Chapel where the Chaplains performed the service.
Fred
**********************
I became curious regarding Congressional/Legislative Prayer after reading some prayers said at the Texas Constitutional Convention of 1845. I wanted to read some the prayers read during the First U. S. Congress (1789-1791).
I availed myself of the U. S. Congressional Documents and Debates (1774 – 1875) Collection available on line at the Library of Congress web site to search for the “prayers to open each session†referred to by Justice Burger. I searched for days without finding one single prayer recorded in the official records of the First U. S. Congress.
I examined the records for the 141 days the House met in 1789 and the 141 days the House met. I checked the House Journal and that of the Senate. I also checked the Annals of Congress. I did not find any evidence of opening prayers.
I backtracked and closely examined the documents/evidence cited by Chief Justice Warren Burger in Marsh v. Chambers (1993) and discovered that the evidence he cited does not support his claim that the two Chaplains to Congress were to open each daily session with prayer. The evidence cited shows only that the two Chaplains were selected and to be paid at a rate of $500.00 per year. The evidence says nothing about the Chaplains opening each daily session with prayers.
It turns out that the Chaplains were paid “at a rate of†$500 per year. Since Congress, in a typical year, met for only six months, the Chaplains were paid only $250 per year. The Appropriations Bill for 1793 shows that a Chaplain to Congress was only budgeted to be paid $250 per year. In the 1797 budget their pay was projected to be only $166.67 for four months.
Justice Burger claimed that the Chaplain’s pay compared favorably with that of the Congressmen. However, this claim is false.
A Congressman was, as projected in the 1793 Appropriations Bill, to be paid $1,033 a year, which does not compare favorably to the estimate of $250 a year for a Chaplain to Congress. A Chaplain to Congress was the lowest paid position on the Congressional Civil List and did not really compare favorably to that of the Assistant Doorkeepers or the Engrossing Clerks. Presented below are the estimates in the 1793 budget for the pay of Congressional Officers and Employees on the Civil List.
Office or Position - Budgeted Pay
Speaker of the House $1,428.00
Congressman $1,033.00
Secretary of the Senate $1,865.00
Clerk of the House of Representatives $1,635.00
Principal clerk to the Secretary of the Senate $547 50
Principal clerk to the Clerk of the House $547.50
Sergeant-at-arms of the House $760.00
Doorkeeper of the House of Representatives$ 500.00
Assistant Doorkeeper of the House $450.00
Engrossing clerk of the House $365.00
Chaplain to the Senate $250.00
Chaplain to the House $250.00
I found no resolution in the records of House or Senate of the First Congress establishing a requirement for daily opening prayers; no record that such a duty was ever assigned to the Chaplains; and no record whatsoever of prayers being read to open any daily assembly.
Prayers in Continental Congress (1774 – 1789) were performed one day a year from 1774 to 1784 except for a brief twenty-eight day period in 1777 when prayers were read daily. Prayer in the Continental Congress was always preceded by a formal resolution for prayer and the prayers so ordered were recorded in the daily journal on the day they were said. Interestingly, the establishment of the Continental Congress Chaplain was discontinued on March 5, 1784. There were no prayers whatsoever from 1784 to 1789.
The rules established by the House and Senate of the First U. s. Congress contain detailed assignments of duties and responsibilities for the all of the Congressional employees on the "Civil List", except that the Chaplains are not even mentioned. The only assignment ever conferred by the First Congress on the Chaplains was to a perform a prayer service for the President, the Vice-President and the members of Congress after the oath of office had been administered to the President on April 30, 1789.
One might reasonably conclude that the First U. S. Congress thought it best not to hold a religious service in the Chamber of the Senate where the President’s swearing in ceremony took place. Congress adjourned (perhaps to divest the Congressmen of their civil authority to legislate) and proceeded as regular citizens (not as government officials) to St. Paul's Chapel where the Chaplains performed the service.
Fred
**********************