Can't End Nicely

This will not be pretty for anybody. As I read the story in the newspaper, a young teacher, either agnostic or non-Christian, has somehow gotten herself into a guerrilla war with her students. It has become public because she put some of her attacks on her Facebook page. That is one of the problems with our social network programs. We forget what is public and what should be private.

In reading the article it does sound like the young teacher has gotten herself into an adversarial relationship with her students. The battleground appears to be over religious activities. The story indicates that she has sent students to the Principal's office when they asked about God in the science class on evolution. She has disciplined students for reading the Bible in her class. She has told students to stop singing "Jesus Loves Me". The students have begun to taunt her and to retaliate by bring pictures of Jesus and putting them on her desk, by leaving evangelistic leaflets for her. The school system has suspended her for more information. It is certainly not an example of tolerance and coexistence of different faiths. I have no information to judge this situation.

But I do know how life is in rural Southern North Carolina. I don't know what happens in other places but I know what I have had to sit through in a host of different public events. I cannot count the times that I have been at public meetings: Chamber of Commerce dinners, United Way luncheons, NAACP banquets, Political Rallies, and had to sit through aggressive evangelical presentations. The person who has been invited to entertain the group somehow feels it is an obligation to preach rather than to sing, to testify rather than play the piano, to "give God glory" rather than tell jokes. In our community it is not surprising that we have not ever had to sit through a Hindu telling us about her religion, or a Jew "testifying" or a Muslim preaching to us. There are almost none of those religions in our community. But I am absolutely convinced that if that were to happen, all "hell would break lose." Our City and County government sessions still start with prayers that are clearly Christian. All the invocations at most public events are Christian in nature.

The story of the teacher who apparently has found these aggressive presentations of the Christian faith a bit of a pain in her neck may be just one of those bumps in the road to the new reality that we recognize that we are not a Christian nation. We may talk about one nation under God or God bless America, but we have yet to officially define who God is and how God might be identified and worshipped. But in this story neither side has made a very attractive argument for one side or the other.