Protect public schools: Keep religious instruction — and its cover-ups — out.
Commentary by Janet Marugg | FāVS News
The thinnest of fracture lines in a heart like mine might as well be veins of iron ore heavy enough to sink it below the protection of my ribs. This is the place where I’m forced to take a stand for my heart’s desire or die to myself inside.
But I am pleasantly surprised to find a spine at the place where my heart fell. Maybe it fell into a puddle of courage. As far as I know, this is the story of all do-gooders and world changers, and I find the broken-hearted and courageous to be good company. Today, decency demands a line is drawn and a decency line does one thing: exposes the indecent.
Indecency is intolerable, and I see in recent entertainment news that it’s been a decade since the movie, “Spotlight,” told the story of a news team’s reporting on a massive church sexual abuse scandal and sexual abuse in churches continues.
Not a week goes by without news of ecclesiastical abuse in one church or another. It is such a problem that there is this: publicly accessible databases of credibly accused clergy and church-related sexual abuse cases.
ProPublica maintains data on abusers within the Catholic Church at a website list called “Credibly Accused.” Latter-day Saints (LDS) abusers are collected on the website Floodlit.org. Sadly, February last saw the Southern Baptist Convention abandon a half-hearted attempt at collecting their extensive sexual abuse cases into accessible data for public and member safety. However, the SBC’s past work remains within their Sexual Abuse Task Force.
To be fair, sexual abuse can happen in any church, especially churches with patriarchal power structures. Today I learned that this is a thing: “Church Molestation Insurance” also called “Sexual Abuse Liability Coverage.” My first thought: How sad. My second: Makes sense.
This is all to say I can’t help but cringe to see Christian lobbyists pimping religious instruction into Idaho public schools. I think the state should leave religious instruction with its resulting databases full of deviant sexual behavior to religious institutions where they are properly insured for the task.
Keep the line of blame clear. Let us at least be able to say this about our public schools: “Kids did not develop inappropriate sexual behaviors here.”
The views expressed in this opinion column are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of FāVS News. FāVS News values diverse perspectives and thoughtful analysis on matters of faith and spirituality.
Thanks, Janet, for giving us another reason to oppose religious instruction in public schools. The main reason remains, I think, that is unconstitutional.
Sadly, sexual abuse and a host of other sins occurs in all organizations that are made of us flawed humans. This is not to excuse it in the Church, but rates of child sexual abuse are actually greater among public school teachers in this nation and we rarely hear about it. We all need to be aware of the log in our own eye before pointing out the speck in our neighbors, however big it may be.
His story is in plain sight for those that want to see it.
When looking at prophets that God sent, they most usually were sent to point out the hypocrisy and sins of His own church and warning them to repent or face the consequences; which they usually ignored, often killing the messenger.
The Bible is written to God’s people. It will not be readily accepted or understood by others, and worse, it will be twisted and maligned, often by those claiming to be Christians.
Until Christians understand that it is for them to digest, internalize and reflect the character of God FIRST and THEN invite others to partake of its blessing, what God has said still rings true: “For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you”, Rom 2:24.