[startover22]

Love to hear your thoughts and opinions on this.

Just picked this up off my counter. A little permission slip for a Bible study for my 1st grader.

PARENTS! RELEASED TIME BIBLE CLASS will provide your child with moral and spiritual training. To enroll your child in this FREE program, sign the enclosed release forms and return them to the school office. For more information call 000-000-0000.

As follows:

I am requesting that my child BLANK, be excused from school each week for one hour ( no more than two hours) for Religious Release, as provided for by Oregon Law. Please have my child meet the designated adult teacher or helper at the school office at the appointed time, to be transported and/or escorted to a nearby facility and be returned after the release time. As this is an excused absence, please give my child any missed assignments and make up time to complete them.
Parent/guardian signature...

[tomder55]

We have that here in NY .Many students in elementary schools do get time at the end of the day to leave school to attend religious instructions . These classes are not held in School as your notification also indicates and ultimately the student is still required to learn what is taught during their period of absence from school.

This is the parents call . However for Catholics at least there is a certain amt. of time needed for religious education to qualify for eligibilty to receive sacraments. .

[startover22]

Yes, I did not add the fact that it is held down the road at the nearest church. ALSO, this is being offered by a non denominational Christian organization.

I for one remember going to bible study in the summers, it was great and we learned a few things. All of my friends and their friends went.

[classyT]

Startover22,

Ok I am really fussy. I'd never let just anyone teach my children Bible classes. If I wanted to send my kids to a Christian school, that is one thing and I'd pick out a school that had the same beliefs as me. But there are so many non denominational churhes out there.. I'd be LEARY and check out their doctrine. Make sure it lines up with what you want your kids taught. Otherwise, it is kind of cool.

[N0help4u]

Yeah I would agree it may be worth checking out the church first but a good ethical sincere church would keep what it teaches in situations like this overall basic concepts where they are not teaching their doctrines which is what I would hope it would be.

I was okay with sending my kids to the Baptist summer vacation Bible schools because they did not teach church doctrine.

[TexasParent]

Is there a released time Satanic Worship class offered to the little ones? ;)

[N0help4u]

Is there a released time Satanic Worship class offered to the little ones? ;)

If people want it they can start one just as they can do the Bible one.

[startover22]

I am not sending him. Just to make it clear here. I was just wondering about what if others want to do the same? Like Texas Parent said? Ohh, it just doesn't end I suppose.

[N0help4u]

You can start ANY group you want as long as you are not 'forcing' anybody to attend. Then it is up to the group to keep it going or not.

[TexasParent]

So "The Fans of Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana Group" could get some time off school? :eek: Oh the humanity!!

[NeedKarma]

Needs more FSM gospel study. Then people would actually end up being nice to each other afterwards

[N0help4u]

Sorry I prefer the purple flying people eater!

[NeedKarma]

Same invisible deity as the others. :) It's all good.

[ETWolverine]

To me, the issue comes down to 2 questions:

Is this a voluntary program?

Can parents decide NOT to do it?

Clearly the answer to these questions is "yes" in this case. So as far as I am concerned, as long as nobody is forcing religion on anyone else, it doesn't violate the supposed "separation between church and state". If the program were either mandatorily enforced or manditorily prohibbited, then it would violate SCS. Since it is voluntary, there is no violation.

As for whether it is a good idea, as one who went to religious schools through most of my education, I see the value of a religious upbringing and religious education. Also, my sister who teaches both in the NY public school system and in a yeshiva (She's a HS AP Science teacher), says often that the kids in the yeshiva are generally better behaved, easier to teach, better at picking up the concepts she is teaching, and have a better pass/fail ratio. So there seems to be a positive correlation between behavior, secular learning and religious education.

Please keep in mind that religion is NOT morality. Religion is a very good tool for TEACHING morality, but religious people can be very immoral, and non-religious people can be very moral. But I believe that a religious education HELPS with teaching morality, if for no other reason than the fact that religious education includes teaching kids about certain characters that are central to the religion that share and exhibit the morals and values we want them to learn. For Jews, that's Moses, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, the great Rabbis of history. For Christians, that is Jesus and the Apostles and the early Christians, Joan of Arc and others. For Muslims that is Mohamed. For the ancient Greeks, it was Hercules and Jason and Odessius. But the figures of religious history give us an example to aspire to morally, ethically and in terms of our behaviors.

By comparison, who do those without religious upbringings and educations turn to as examples? Surely there are many heroes, moral leaders, etc. that they can turn to. But they cannot (in MOST cases) say "That person was one of ours, and look what he did," thus creating a living connection between the student and the character in question.

Without that connection, it seems to me that it would be harder to teach the morals of the ancients. When the student asks, "what does that old dead guy's actions have to do with me," what answer does the parent who doesn't use religion as his/her basis for moral teachings answer? Yes, there are good answers to that question, but it just seems more difficult to me.

Just my opinion.

Elliot

[NeedKarma]

By comparison, who do those without religious upbringings and educations turn to as examples?

Good people. We don't care about categorizing them into groups.

[michealb]

Only have one thing that really concerns me about releasing kids from school for religious worship.
It's that I'm sure the Churches make this time much more fun than being in class for 2 hours. Especially if there are so many kids out that the teacher just assigns busy work for the children left behind. A first grader doesn't have the reasoning to understand. All they might get is "I'm not this religion so I'm being punished."

[N0help4u]

I use to go to symphonies in grade school to get out of class. It was torture for me but anything was worth getting out of class!
I don't see any harm as long as they are teaching basic Love they neighbor concepts and not promoting their doctrine. I have never seen the Baptist churches push their beliefs on my kids when I sent them to VBC.