Death by Symbols

[from a recent report in Christianity Today]

A plaintiff known as Doe 2 recently said that if s/he had to attend a high school graduation ceremony in a Christian church, s/he would be "forced to submit to a religious environment that … will make me feel extremely uncomfortable and offended."

Doe 2 (as in "John Doe") was one of five plaintiffs who sought an injunction against Enfield Public Schools to prevent them from holding the graduation ceremony in First Cathedral, a Christian Church. The judge granted the injunction, in part because she agreed that there was the "likelihood of irreparable harm" coming to the plaintiffs.

That phrase—"the likelihood of irreparable harm"—made me laugh when I first read it, but after examining the ruling, I understood. Doe 3 is Jewish and said s/he would not have attended the ceremony because s/he would "feel that the Cathedral is proselytizing its Christian beliefs … through its scriptures and symbols." A high school graduation is indeed an important cultural marker, so one can empathize how deeply disappointing it would be to miss it.

Kent comments:

First of all, “Doe 2” might want to repeat English class.  The verb “proselytize” - if it has an object – requires that the object be those who might be brought to certain beliefs, not the beliefs to which they might be brought.  So “the Cathedral” cannot “proselytize its Christian beliefs.”  Perhaps “Doe 2” should stick to words with which “s/he” is familiar.

But quibbling aside, something struck me about this matter.  The judge agrees that, if Jewish kid enters a building filled with Christian symbols, there is a likelihood of irreparable harm coming to said Jewish kid.

However, what about the irreparable harm that comes to students across our nation who are ‘proselytized’ daily into a faith of Darwinism, relativism, statism, etc. every day by their teachers down at the public school?  These students are not simply subjected to a picture of Darwin – that might be harmless enough.  They are required, for example, to think – or at least to pretend to think – as though what Darwin taught is true!

There is very little hope for improvement in our culture as long as we subject our children to the ideas of that great trinity of falsehoods – Marx, Darwin, and Freud.  Yet the false ideas of these three permeate almost every classroom of American today.  (The few who escape these are usually subjected to the idiocy of postmodernism instead.)

Meanwhile, we fret over whether a Jewish student might see a cross on the wall at graduation.