Education Law

Aggressive Churches and School Influence

I was sort of disturbed by this story out of Gainesville earlier this week which had a local church encouraging its school age students to wear t-shirts to school which said "Islam is of the Devil." The Gainesville Sun has pictures and video. Starting at 2:58, the pastor starts speaking, and it is worth listening to.

Now, the principal (or Dean or whatever) of the school said the front of the shirt, which contains a bible verse, could be worn in school. Big mistake. I would absolutely ban that as well.

But, the general point here is the aggressiveness of the pastor in promoting religious messages at school. That is something that is simply unacceptable. The First Amendment protects their right to worship in whatever way they see fit, but it absolutely does not give them the ability to proselytize at school - and that is what this pastor was attempting to do.

There really is no legal recourse against this church or this pastor, but I do hope the people of Gainesville have enough sense to find a different church and put this pastor out of work.

Full post as published by Edjurist on September 02, 2009 (boomark / email).