Did A Texas Teacher Take Away This Little Girl’s Bible During Reading Time?
A family in Cypress, Texas is claiming that during the school’s “read to myself” time, their 2nd grade daughter’s Bible was taken away by a teacher.
The family feared retaliation from filing a complaint, so declined going to the school’s principal. Instead, they reached out to religious action group Liberty Institute to lodge their complaint on their behalf with the Cypress-Fairbanks school district.
Senior counsel for the Liberty Institute Michael Berry says that the alleged incident happened approximately two weeks ago at Fred and Louise Hamilton Elementary School. He also added that the Bible is available in the school’s library. “If it’s appropriate for their own library, why on Earth would it not be appropriate for their own students.”
One parent found the story appalling. “They’re letting them read the Hunger Games, that’s kids killing kids, why can’t they read the Bible?” However, that same parent did wonder why the family wouldn’t go directly to the school. “The staff is very supportive and very much looks to resolve things in the best interest of the child.”
Berry says that the family had concerns their child would be targeted. “They felt that we would be able to better communicate that and give the school the opportunity to do the right thing to correct this.”
“I think that every child should be able to read whatever they choose and I’m pro-Christianity and if my child chooses to bring a Bible to school I would fight for my child,” said school parent Jennifer Muse.
Meanwhile, another parent supported the school’s strict separation of church and state. “There should be a definite separation. I’ve been very angry at other parents here that push the Bible and religion on my children.”
Separation of church and state is the concept that a nation’s government lacks authority in the people’s individual religious beliefs and therefore the two should be kept distinctly separate. Yet while its understandable that teachers shouldn’t use the bible as a source material for public school classes or have students sing religious songs, this incident seems to contradict the point of the concept.
The school’s district is claiming that they heard about the incident initially through the media.
What do you think? Should the little girl have been free to read whatever book she wanted to or did the teacher do the right thing by taking away the Bible? Was the concept of separation of church and state properly upheld in this case or grossly misinterpreted?
