An Ohio nonprofit that provides off-site Bible instruction to public school students during classroom hours says it will triple its programs in Indiana this fall after new legislation forced school districts to comply.
To participating families, nondenominational LifeWise Academy programs supplement religious instruction. But critics in Indiana worry the programs spend public school resources on religion, proselytize to students of other faiths and remove children from class in a state already struggling with literacy.
LifeWise founder and CEO Joel Penton told The Associated Press that many parents want religious instruction to be part of their children’s education.
“Values of faith and the Bible are absolutely central to many families,” Penton said. “And so they want to demonstrate to their children that it is central to their lives.”
Public schools cannot promote any religion under the First Amendment, but a 1952 Supreme Court ruling centered on New York schools cleared the way for programs like LifeWise. Individual places of worship often work with schools to host programs off campus, and they are not regulated in some states.
Well that’s interesting. When I was a teenager in Indiana, a bunch of us Jewish students asked if we could take Hebrew as our language elective off-site and were told no. I was an atheist (and still am), but I felt it was worth learning for the sake of my heritage more than Latin or German. It was going to be secular instruction. We were still told no.
I have a feeling Jewish kids would still be told no.
TST time
Nah, keep it Hebrew and really make them question their support for Israel. If talking about Israel is a controversial subject, make them explicitly say Hebrew studies isn’t allowed.
TST is fun to rile up the thumpers but having a real geopolitical hot potato land like a bomb in Terra Haute would be amazing. They aren’t ready for so much spice.
TST is a style imo, anyone from any religion can use the same framework
LifeWise founder and CEO Joel Penton told The Associated Press that many parents want religious instruction to be part of their children’s education.
And those parents can take their kids to Sunday school
The LDS church has been doing pretty much this same thing for a very long time. It’s why you see wards and church property adjacent to almost every public high school in the north western states. They have also ruled politics in their more populous areas.
Ex Mormon, can confirm. This was my very first thought when reading the headline. “Lol I did this as a pre-teen and teen in LA in the 90s and 00s.” This is called “seminary”, which in Mormonism does not mean what it means to other religious traditions. “Seminary” just means “scripted religious classes for bored sleepy teenagers taught by an unqualified volunteer parent every school day for 45 mins somewhere off campus before school starts.”
In Mormonism this means “studying” (aka the teacher reads you a standardized lesson plan and asks comprehension questions) the Book Of Mormon, The Pearl of Great Price, The Doctrine And Covenants, the New Testament, and the Old Testament. These five texts make up the Mormon canon.
In the time and place that I did seminary, it was not formally linked to the public school system. But in predominantly-Mormon Utah, I believe seminary was officially part of the public school curriculum in most (all?) school districts and classes were often held on-campus in school classrooms and counted towards your diploma.
So, yeah. This shit is nothing new.
I spent my high school years as a newly born again Christian in the Bible Belt, so I would’ve been the weirdo who loved something like this. This was definitely not a thing where I grew up. It is so weird to think of LA being a religious indoctrination hotbed, that is not something I expected.
Lifewise Clown Academy 🤡
Christians are always so concerned about teaching others, particularly kids. If they would actually learn to practice instead of preach, they may find more folks believing there was truth in their new testament.
well, this is fucked.
Is the primary difference between this and CCD the fact that it’s done during school hours?
That and it’s done in the taxpayer-funded public school system.
If they want their kids to have religious studies, they can pay for it through faith schools or homeschool.
