Prayer Currently Deemed Illegal in BOE Meetings

This thread is weird, coz not long time ago, some people are complaining about this, now they seem to want the opposite.

3 Reasons the Ground Zero Mosque Debate Makes No Sense

reply to post by Sinnthia


you dont need that chewing gum.

you dont need that rock and roll music either.

better make them both felonies.

whats that? a picture of your family in your wallet? FELON!!!

I find the direction that this thread went very interesting- as far as the arguments over the government and whether "the government, constitution, et al." can step into religious matters and decide things... state, or federal.
Very interesting...

... especially in light of the Department of Justice's recent lawsuit against the school district in Chicago for denying a teacher who had been employed for less than a year a three week leave during school term so she could take her "once in a life time pilgrimige to Mecca".
The teacher resigned. She was not fired. Now our "secular" DOJ is filing a lawsuit against the school for compensation, back pay, etc... to 2007, even though she resigned, because her religious freedoms were "infringed.

reply to post by thegoodearth


that is very interesting.

link to article

While i don't think praying to the invisible/non-existence should be banned, i can't see why it is of any use or productivity at a BOE meeting.

I have found with my experience that actually getting off your knees and using your hands to actually DO soemthing is a far more productive way for acheiving your wishes.

Originally posted by freedish
reply to post by Sinnthia

 

What is the point in answering your questions if you do not believe Jesus
is the Son of God?

edit on 15-1-2011 by freedish because: (no reason given)

edit on 15-1-2011 by freedish because: (no reason given)

What is the point of coming to a multi-confessional multi religional DISCUSSION BOARD if you have no intereest in engaging people that are not your mental clones??????

I've read the newspaper article posted by the OP, as well as the majority of replies to this thread. It seems to me that some individuals are confused. From my understanding, the OP read a newspaper article and immediately came to the conclusion that "prayers" are now a felony. This is not the case.

From reading the newspaper article, it would appear that the "director" of the meeting opened the Board of Education meetings with a Christian prayer. Chances are, that not everyone in those meetings were Christians, so someone within the meeting (or outside of it) issued a complaint; perhaps something dealing with "Separation of State and Church."

In my opinion, meetings such as these, should start off with a "moment of silence," to allow those who are religious to carry on with their prayers, and those who are not, to gather their thoughts. Also, let's not assume that people are atheists just because they don't agree with prayers being conducted openly at meetings. I believe that to be a form of stereotyping.

reply to post by DSeal


Let's just remember that trying to ban Prayers is like putting a control on what people think, mind-control is wrong. If some people want to wish to an invisible being in there heads, we can't stop them, we shoudn't try to either.

I just don't see what use prayer is in any meeting. The meeting is regarding a discussion between men, not to personally wish for things. from God. Again, The meeting is between man and man, not man and God.

Re Saltheart Foamfollower

You wrote:

["Anyway, I have nothing against atheists, but boy do they push their religion."]

What 'religion'? The 'I ignore or deny christianity' religion? The 'I ignore or deny islam' religion, or the 'I ignore or deny all organised, doctrinal theism'. Similarly we have the 'I ignore or deny the existence of Santa Claus, the easter bunny or the tooth-fairy' movements, which with your semantic twist describe ideological positions some people ARRIVE AT. Organizing into 'deny Santa Claus' groups and writing their own doctrines or holy manuals about it.

Whereas most atheists simply just can't find any validation for theist claims whatsoever and LEAVE such notions behind as meaningless, not worth considering; unless they are exposed to invasive religious propaganda, trying to take over society.

I suggest you get a grip on logic and semantics.

reply to post by awake_and_aware


Would people really think that replacing "prayers" in meetings with a "moment of silence" to better accommodate the masses be "banning prayers?"

I guess that we can't make everybody happy without offending someone hmm.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower
I think it should be a crime for religion to not be allowed everywhere.

Forcing everyone in the US to adhere to a religion whether they want to or not?
That sounds uniquely American.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower
Anyway, I have nothing against atheists, but boy do they push their religion.

edit on 16-1-2011 by saltheart foamfollower because: (no reason given)

Oh so it is not just the constitution you have a problem with, it is also English words and what they mean?

A BOE meeting is not a church. Atheism is not a religion. The US is not a theocracy. Sounds like you want a ticket to the middle east.

Originally posted by RelentlessLurker
reply to post by Sinnthia

 

you dont need that chewing gum.

you dont need that rock and roll music either.

better make them both felonies.

whats that? a picture of your family in your wallet? FELON!!!

I would really like to respond to this since it is apparently directed at me but given my posts in this thread, I can only assume you meant to reply to someone else as well as add a thought or two to pull it all together?

Look, I am a teacher, and I cannot begin to tell you how worried I am about religious zealots taking over the education system in our country. Texas, who orders the largest amount of textbooks every year basically gets to decide what goes in to these textbooks. They really set the curriculum for the entire country. This is hugely problematic for the subjects of History and Science because of how these school board members there cling to their Christianity and allow it to sway their decision. THIS IS WRONG. Religion should stay in church/synagogue/mosque/temple/HOME. Our founding fathers recognized a need for the seperation of church and state because if one religion takes over, all the others will feel threatened and you end up with major problems and in fighting.

TAKE A LOOK AT WHAT WENT ON DURING THE LAST DECADE.

Prayer has no place what-so-ever in any of our governmental systems. Nothing else needs to be said about it.

reply to post by DSeal


A moment of silence is more about respect than mindlessly praying to something you can't prove exists. Praying at work or in a working enviroment is just a daydream in which you wish for something, regardless of whether you clasp your hands together or not. While i appreciate we can't ban the thoughts of other man, i do think there is a time and place for praying (but not for me)

On general grounds there's a recurrent theme, which pro-theists constantly take up from various directions.

Religious freedom.

And obviously never having heard about egalitarian principles in contemporary society-forming (or maybe feeling 'above' such principles), they claim SPECIAL privileges for their specific ideology.

Because while maybe paying lipservice to egalitarianism, 'everybody ought' to acknowledge, that THEIR ideology is divinely sanctioned (or something like that) to be somewhat more egalitarian than anything else, and thus be exempt from the general rules.

Seen from a non-believer perspective it looks like this: "We have SPECIAL rights, and anybody interfering with our special rights and claims are infringing on us".

Similarly: "The oppressor feels oppressed if his/her oppression is opposed".

To illustrate this I will return to a kind of examples, I have presented formerly on this thread.

I take it from the attitude of many pro-theists here, that it's general theism at stake. So consider following:

Tantrics have physical sex as part of their 'religion'/spiritual system, and any tantrics joining a school-board meeting must ofcourse on grounds of religious 'freedom' have the option to perform whatever religious ritual or service they wish.
So they must be supplied with a suitable piece of furniture where they can be religious, and possibly also be told to keep it quiet, so as not to disturb other religionists insisting on public performance of THEIR different religious manifestations.

Or we can take some religionists being heavily into blood-offerings. Maybe their functionality as school-board members depends on a dead goat or two, like in the good OT (though it's questionable, if the goats can be persuaded to be quiet).

Most people would consider such suggestions or practices absurd. But why? The general principle of religious freedom seem to be of primary importance, and if one religion has its way, others must also. According to the kind of pseudo-logic used to support pro-theism, there's no way around such religious excesses, no matter how bizarre they may seem to some.

So how can this kind of aburdities be avoided. Simply; return to square one with EGALITARIAN egalitarianism, where no-one has any privileges. That is: Use the rules of liberal, democratic non-elitist society.

But no doubt, soon we'll hear claims of privileges again.

reply to post by suigeneris


You have asked several times for the law that makes prayer illegal. Yet you are the one claiming it's a felony. If your claim is that it's illegal, then provide some proof. All I see in this article is a man ranting about how it's illegal, with nothing to back up his claim. I'm very confused by this thread and I don't seem to be the only one.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/dadc41112d8d.jpg[/atsimg]

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/74006b92ca12.jpg[/atsimg]

reply to post by bogomil


Bogomil, as usual your words show your wisdom; whether anyone will take note of the wisdom is another matter.

Star for you. Please don't think people are not listening to your words, i certainly am.

reply to post by awake_and_aware

Well I think it's plain rude to foist prayers on everyone in a secular setting. What's even more interesting and ironic is that most of the time if the situation is reversed these same people are the ones screaming about how they're being put upon or put out or taken "over." Which, I'm not altogether convinced isn't exactly the point that non-Christian groups and even atheists in the U.S. are trying to make to point out the hypocrisy. Didn't (some) Christians open that door, so to speak? If you have such a burning need to pray everywhere and all the time at whatever the expense to others and no matter what others think (even other Christians who prefer their worship and prayer to be more private), that might be an indication that you might be happier at a monastery or nunnery or your religious happy place of choice is and not out in open society.

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic

Yeah...big difference between illegal and deemed inappropriate by society as a whole, isn't there? I'm no expert, but I highly doubt there is any law on the books regarding prayer.

Re Lucidity

Obviously I agree with you, and even if my opinion is getting rather repetitive (but then the pro-theist camp itself has half a dozen basic 'arguments' it repeats over and over), I will emphasize the missionary aspect of extremist christianity (and some similar ideologies).

I would guess, that most readers of this thread know a lot of religious or otherwise ideological individuals (in my case from several different religions), and in my opinion a majority of them are perfectly nice, agreeable and decent persons, who don't have this obsessive need of pushing their ideologies on makind.

As I have spent most of my life on the fringe of mainstream, I've had a lot of firsthand contact with compatriots in weirdness, and based on that I'm quite convinced, that the pushy extremist isn't so much motivated by the 'message' itself, which he/she tries to enforce on mankind, but rather by having a special mindset, where special existential or psychological drives are at the core of his/her character. It's being a missionary per se, which counts.

And I'm equally convinced, that this can be observed through the very 'methodology' mostly used by fanatics to 'prove' and spread their claims. As in the example on this thread, where it's been suggested, that "a few seconds isn't too much to ask for" (which gives you time to say 'glory be', but not more). And then when the salesman's foot already is in the door: "Or maybe a few minutes", and then later (I suspect): "Let's call it ten minutes, and we want exclusive rights".

Anybody can see through these tactical maneuvers, which coupled with cottage industry 'semantics', 'logic', 'science' can make most victims annoyed and the outcome is naturally confrontational polarizations, which the relaxed ideologuers never get into.

(I have been a confirmed vegetarian myself for 45 years, and I doubt if anyone really notices or cares very much).

Well, in the present confrontation, the 'practical' aspect of the situation is so simply solved, that only a post or two on this thread would have been necessary. But a lot of "we have 'rights' ", "we are persecuted" etc are presented, as far as I can see with only one aim: To provocate a confrontation.

(I remember similar tactics used by hard-core commies in my youth. Some demonstration with several thousand peaceful participators would tun into a violent streetfight between everybody and the police, as a result of a few well-directed commie-thrown stones).

Amongst all the options these school-board christians have for praying, before (loud) or under (silent) meeting procedures, they choose the one which will lead to the most irritation, and which then can be brought to the attention of debate-forums.

Don't these people want to spread their ideology? So why are they behaving in such a way as to p... everybody off, unless it's for the pure joy of missioning?


Re: Awake_and_aware

Thanks, Dude.

reply to post by bogomil


I read you regarding the evangelical aspect, and starred your post prior to this one. Thinking, though, that while evangelicism is probably a contributing factor some of the time, this probably is more of a random, personal, or individual issue that gets more than its fair share of attention due to the political climate. Opportunism. And opportunism that is not relegated to a particular belief or cause either. The vast, vast, vast majority of people are not this extreme, but when we run across those who are, there is not getting a point understood. They simply don't see what doors they're opening and how another person might feel if the perspectives were reversed. Most people realize this and just stay silent. And this in turn backfires and causes even more of the same. I'm personally pretty sick of both hearing about it (usually from the people with the issues) and having the few pandered to...something so logical and so obvious shouldn't be this hard.