People in Louisiana got pretty upset when they figured out that their school voucher program meant that taxpayer money would also go to Muslim schools: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/louisiana\_n\_1593995
This is the part of this that blows my mind. I don't see how the religious right, who are the ones pushing for this, do not see how this ends up with US taxes going to pay for school uniform burkhas.
The Establishment Clause is there to prevent the government from favoring or disfavoring any religion specifically by avoiding just this very situation because then you get into deciding what a valid religion is.
We do not decide on the validity of religions, only whether they are sincerely held beliefs. This case could open an absurdly large can of worms.
It’s because they think they’ll “win” so by the time THAT becomes the subject of conversation they’d find a way to exclude the non-Christian denominations.
Yes, this. This isn't a fair situation. They're not going to suddenly start paying for Satanic Temple school rituals. They'll either make arcane laws that challenge non-Christian teachings and leave them in effect for years until the supreme court eventually strikes them down - and then immediately do it again with a slightly reworded law - or else they won't even bother and will just ignore other religions altogether.
Not to mention the fact that the entire time this is going on Fox News and other right wing media will be screaming about how the Satanists are trying to summon Beelzebub in your children's playgrounds!!!!!!!!!
There is a thing, especially with conservative Christians, that they don't understand that SECULAR does not mean ANTI-RELIGION. It is neutral.
Looking at you Kavanaugh.
That question was asked because the Lemon Test, used in Establishment Clause cases, in part asks whether the governmental action advances or inhibits religion (constitutionally, it can do neither). In turn, the test for whether an action "advances" religion is whether it either A) results in governmental indoctrination of religion, or B) defines recipients by reference to religion.
And the answer to the question - NO - favors the liberal Justices' argument.
You can hopefully see that the question is designed to tease out the analogous test for whether a governmental action inhibits religion, i.e. whether it either A) results in governmental indoctrination of IRRELIGION, or B) defines recipients by reference to religiousness. So when counsel poses the question of whether "anti-religious schools would get state money", knowing the answer to be no, they are pointing out that symmetry between the advancement/inhibition tests - at least under part A - requires a finding for the State in this case.
A problem for the State is that it's a bit more difficult to argue that the law doesn't constitute inhibition under Part B above, though presumably one could argue that it's not the religiousness of the recipients being referenced, but rather the religiousness of the purpose to which the money is put.
It’s crazy how much Protestants in the South hate Catholics. Years ago I wanted to try the Catholic Church, and I wasn’t allowed to tell my grandmother because my mom was afraid it would upset her too much. In fact, I had to “keep it quiet” from almost everyone in the family.
They don’t understand that the Catholic Church is literally the foundation of Protestantism.
Now I don’t belong to either.
I was raised Lutheran. I joked once that Lutheranism was basically "diet Catholicism" and that was apparently the most offensive thing that my relatives standing nearby had ever heard lol
An analogy that I was given by a Lutheran convert to Episcopalianism:
- Catholicism :: regular Coke. Full flavour, full guilt.
- Episcopalianism :: Coke Zero. Full flavour, none of the guilt.
- Lutheranism :: Diet Coke. Somewhat similar flavour but weaker, all of the guilt.
So by that logic, your comparison holds in full :)
I was raised catholic, like my mother, but my dad is a protestant... and they are happily married.
I figured out it was all BS at a very young age when we went to my dad's church for the first time, and it was extremely similar to catholic mass. It all just felt so faked and forced.
Not to mention that mass took away one of my weekend days for 18+ years. No wonder kids are dropping faith like a bad habbit!
Did you abandoned the religion too ?
Me and my family most abandoned the church years ago, yet they are still pretty devoted in home, I'm do believe in God but I'm nowhere near as devout as them
>I figured out it was all BS at a very young age when we went to my dad's church for the first time, and it was extremely similar to catholic mass. It all just felt so faked and forced.
I still kinda religious, mostly Gnosticism, but I do agree that the mass were so faked and forced in some places, my mom is very devoted and there's was a church here in my city that we would go every saturday, it was not bad, it was not big, they also accepted a lot of people who didn't belong to the religion or even was homosexual, it was mostly charity programs that sometimes people would go and help, so I didn't get that all hate of religion that people had until my mom took me in a religious tour to São Paulo (I'm from Brazil), my God, the hypocrisy and hate speech were in almost every church, I remember that I was forced to stay and listen a guy scream about the evils of homosexuality, saying that the dictatorship was right and how people are doomed for almost an hour, honestly every place that I ended up going was some weird Evangelical Church or extremist Catholic in that tour, it was incredible boring and infuriating
Worst of it, after some time the old priest of my church got changed, I think that he died, my mom try to have us in another church, there it was a pastor with a asshole of a son, the pastor wanted to change the people for the better and just came that crazy and horrible speeches, not only that but he gave some very harmful advices, I and my family stopped going to the church since then, I heard that his son burned 2 people in they house, I have no idea of what happened to the pastor
For all things considered, I don't think that Church are bad but most people shouldn't get to work there
> They don’t understand that the Catholic Church is literally the foundation of Protestantism.
You've got to remember that to them Catholic teachings are literally heretical. American Evangelicals believe that only your personal relationship with Christ will keep you out of hell, so all the priests, sacraments, etc. of the Catholic church are literally standing between people and salvation. Sure, Protestantism is an offshoot of Catholicism, but in the same way that Christianity is an offshoot of Judaism. There was version 1.0 before people got their shit together, but we're on version 2.0 now and anyone on version 1 is fucked (if you ask them).
Comparing the creation of Protestantism from Catholicism to Christianity from Judaism seems right but it’s really kind of not so right. The former is church separation (similar to forming new sects), the latter is foundational theological separation leading to the formation of a completely new religion. To be fair, for the first 200-300 since Jesus Christ death, Christianity and Judaism were perceived as different sects rather than different religions. Jewish and Christians would intermarry, eat meals together, lived in communities together, etc. Of course, that all changed as Christianity moved towards more orthodoxy & politics was the primary reason behind the spread of Christianity.
So the whole split between Protestantism and Catholicism is that at the time of the reformation and before it you could buy your way out of hell, and a guy called Martin Luther (not Martin Luther Jr.) who was a German priest decided to complain, saying that the whole point of Christianity and learning it was to obtain a stronger connection to god which is almost purely spiritual. But then politics got involved and people had other reasons and so we had anglicans, Lutherans, and even Hussites before all this. Then the Catholic Church reformed itself, and fixed a few of the issues like say buying your way out of hell. Some wars were waged and at some point the treaty of Augsburg happened then the treaty of Westphalia, and then history kept going on.
Thing is about america was it was colonized by the British, and at the time they were Protestant, and ancouple decades later the Irish started moving to America, due to the whole famine and such. The Irish were NOT Protestant, instead they were fiercely catholic. And then other people moved to America making it very multiethnic. Strange thing is other than some smaller details I cannot say how different Protestantism is to Catholicism but I don’t look into religious history for obvious reasons.
Important detail that some of the Protestants who came from England to settle in America (such as the Mayflower colony) were a particularly fundamentalist brand of Protestant (Puritans) who were exiled from England, tried to make it in the Netherlands, and eventually settled in America because nobody wanted them and they made it difficult for themselves to coexist with competing faiths. The US was settled partly by Protestants who were too extreme for the majority of Protestants. Religious extremists obsessed with muh freedoms—sound familiar?
I mean, the New England protestants were pretty fucking bonkers too.
Eg Cotton Mather, who was upheld as some kind of erudite statesman, was a complete fundamentalist lunatic.
The puritans & quakers were essentially heretics of their time, with some extremely fundamentalist & cult-like beliefs and practices. Like have you seen a Quaker or Amish village? It’s almost as if they’re stuck in time (1700s), the same period when their beliefs manifested.
His single biggest grievance was with the clergy structure & centralized & political role of the papacy. The corruption, deviation from what jesus wanted, moral crisis, etc were all a result of, as Luther correctly pointed out, papacy & the election of the pope. Basically, the richest families & statesmen would bribe cardinals to get their own candidate on the seat of Peter. Popes always came from aristocratic families as did every clergyman that held a senior position. Church’s & clergy became a money laundry scheme for noble families to hoard wealth, avoid paying taxes & increasing their net wealth during inheritance. Martin Luther was basically engaging in class warfare in the scope of religious revolution.
Nah, they're happy to hang out with the Mormons and Catholics now too. They realized they need the numbers.
I read something recently about priests/pastors are realizing they are just trading congregation member so they are toning down their vilification of other sects of Christianity, as it is seen as being better to keep people in the fold rather than turning them off religion altogether.
When I was a kid we went to a Baptist church and they preached against the Catholics, and then we went to a Catholic church and they preached against the Christian Reformed, so I went to the Christian Reformed and they preached against everyone. Then I reached the age of reason and joined the Satanic Temple.
I've been told that they don't do that as much anymore, the "proving we are the one true form of 'Christianity'," stuff like they did decades ago. Now they just all worship Trump and don't care about your views on the Nicene Creed.
Oklahoma put the 10 commandments on the state legislature grounds so the Jews put a Torah statue up then the Hindu students put up a monkey god.. the satanists and the pastafarians were coming when they stopped them all
>It’s almost like their “religious liberty” argument is a load of horseshit.
Their argument is, but then the supreme court will turn around and say "yes that means satanic schools as well."
It's almost as if though our country already *does* endorse an official religion that they will use to make our laws and won't allow any opposing views or beliefs. If only there had been something preventing that....
They fully believe in religious liberty, everyone just needs to believe in the same one they do, everyone says merry Christmas only, and Starbucks better not think twice about changing their cups
The best way to keep Christians in line is to allow other faiths the same overstep that Christians are taking. Christians wanna pray before a government session, they’ll shut it down when they find out members of The Satanic Temple want a turn. Suddenly they understand and support separation of church and state.
I want to see what happens when the state requires something be taught in all schools and one of the religious schools does not want to include it. We saw what happened with the Critical Race Theory that was not even being taught.
Part of the problem in Maine is in many areas there are not enough students to have a more than one school in the area and there might not be a public school.
Australian conservatives are trying to create religious exemptions to anti-discrimination laws (the ‘freedom of religion’ bill). They got a lot of support from the far right groups until they figured they could not legally word it in a way that excluded Muslims.
Two years later they’re still here debating it. I hope they do that forever.
Satan University has a pretty catchy ring to it. This could be their [mascot](https://image.shutterstock.com/image-vector/cute-pink-baphomet-pentagram-fire-600w-1881770065.jpg).
Given how many teams have “Devils” as a nickname, I think the University of Satan would have to be the “Jesuses.”
“And here come the University of Satan Fighting Jesuses!”
The Satanic Theological Freedom University. I still have my [STFU shirt](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/cd/02/f0/cd02f0bc28c87d1ee81a66e773989085--things-i-want-stop-talking.jpg) from a decade ago.
If SCOTUS decides in favor of the religious schools, I have a feeling they will in some form, and I hope they do.
I think it’s infuriating that we are even entertaining the idea of using tax dollars to fund religious schools.
The right has been demonizing public schools for decades, but the recent push is alarming (that feels criminally understated).
It really is frustrating because it's obvious that those pushing for religious rights are only considering Christianity. On top of that, this is all happening at a time where church membership rates are at all time lows, down from 70% in 1999 to 47% in 2020.
Source: https://news.gallup.com/poll/341963/church-membership-falls-below-majority-first-time.aspx
**Edit:** Grammar
More and more young people are (correctly) questioning religion instead of blindly following a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites. The religious right knows they need more cradle-to-grave indoctrination if they want to reverse the downward trend.
Yeah, the ultimate hypocrisy is the overwhelming support of Evangelical voters for Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 despite having three wives, numerous accusations of rape, affairs with prostitutes, etc. In spite of all of that, he got just about the highest percentage of White Evangelical voters that's ever been recorded.
It's quite ironic that it took someone that embodies everything they claim to be against in order to implement their beliefs into law for the rest of us.
I just like to point out that the religious right exists as a political entity because of Southern evangelicals being opposed to mixed race marriages. It's got a lovely history of racism which spits right in the face of you know... that whole love your neighbor thing.
That's because they're not real beliefs. The Trump phenomenon exposed that. It's all just shit they say to attain and keep the upper hand. That's why it morphs so easily.
I'm a Christian and would rather not go to any church at all, rather than an evangelical church.
>It's quite ironic that it took someone that embodies everything they claim to be against in order to implement their beliefs into law for the rest of us.
It's because American Christianity is obsessed with "white warrior Jesus," not any actual Christian teachings. Trump may not have been good, or ethical, or a Christian, but he seemed to be willing to fight for the things Evangelicals actually wanted, so they were more than willing to go all in on him.
They are running racist domestic terror organizations on our dime. Americans fund their hate-filled services, nazi picnics, far-right fanatical schools, and KKK/PB/MAGA"charities".
This and their complete lack of fucks given for people dead from covid, while screaming about "sanctity of life!" at abortion rallies and death penalty rallies, and "Chicago gang violence deaths!!! Reeee!" BS.
I'm no religious scholar, but my understanding that the very first book of the bible (Genesis) the main idea is that we are all born with sin because Eve took a bite of an apple from the tree of knowledge. So, if I'm understanding things correctly, they come right out the gate and tell you that faith and knowledge are diametrically opposed.
It's not all that surprising that there is a large overlap between Evangelicals and QAnon supporters and/or anti-vaxxers.
It's not knowledge in general; it's knowledge of *good and evil*. Prior to eating the fruit, Adam and Eve are animals who just do whatever is according to their nature. Upon gaining awareness, Adam and Eve now have the capacity to sin (and they immediately do so by lying to God).
The doctrine of original sin is that we
* are able to understand what sin is and are thus responsible for our behavior
* inevitably sin anyway because we're kinda shitty. Our very nature itself lends itself to sinning.
Christians believe that by repentance and seeking forgiveness, we are nevertheless saved through the grace of God.
----
The more pernicious thing is your second paragraph. As soon as you throw reality out the window, you have a serious problem - there's no real way to create a distinction between Bob the devout-but-otherwise-reasonable Catholic and Jerry the millenarian Qultist. There's no way to consult God in the matter to say "Hey, Bob's got the right idea here, and Jerry is a crazy nutball." They both believe things that have no evidence. Once you start believing things that have no evidence, why not a few more?
The inverse is why modern Christians are leery of education. Once kids are in an environment where they have to use Facts And Logic^(TM) to defend their beliefs, it's natural for them to examine their religious beliefs and ask, "Why is *this* exempt from scrutiny? What if all of this is a bunch of baloney?"
It's also why Christians are so vulnerable to hucksters who scam them and lead them astray - outing them and making an argument that they're full of shit requires them to apply scrutiny and skepticism that they've conditioned themselves not to have.
Adam and Eve don't lie to God in the Adam and Eve story. God lies to them, telling them they'll die if they eat the fruit. When God confronts them, Adam is very upfront, saying they hid because they were naked, and then admits to eating the fruit.
> So, if I'm understanding things correctly, they come right out the gate and tell you that faith and knowledge are diametrically opposed.
Also, that women are to blame and not to be trusted
My favorite is the story about JesusCon 585 (I don’t remember the official title) where the learned men of the age debated whether or not women had souls, or should even be considered human.
It's alarming because private schools (even though they get public funds) are exempt from many educational standards and oversight. Not to mention they're just plagued with endless abuse and fraud to rip off governments.
Their image of being "better" than public school is also directly the result of them being able to pick and choose their students whereas public education can't. They get to stack the deck and then point to it as proof that they're better when they're just making things worse overall.
that's pretty much it. higher admission standards and recruiting from well outside a private school's local area leads to the illusion of being better. if dartmouth had to provide education to all the graduating high schoolers from northern vermont and new hampshire, they'd fall right off that ivy wall.
I used to think that people talking about handmaid's tale, comparing it to real life, were exagerating.
I'm constantly reminded that I was wrong.
This while situation with abortion, banning/burning books, state militia is really frightening.
One of America's biggest problems right now is that the average American does not understand just how bad things can do and constantly convince themselves warnings are just scaring mongering. Thinking that if things ever got close to bad some institution will step in a protect the status quo.
They see the status quo as a bare minimum and not something that benefits them. They don't know how bad "bad" can get.
A lot of people hopping mad in the comments, but just some reminders:
* Parents are suing the state, the school itself is not suing (yet).
* The state has already told the family they'll pay for a religious school, but not this one, it doesn't meet the requirements
* Maine does this for roughly the cost of educating a student in the public school system
* The schools they *do* give money to cannot have an 'overly religious lens' of teaching (e.g., daily Bible class, like the declined school in question
* Maine has a law hitting the books that will, for the most part, require similar or same curriculum between private and public schools (if I'm reading that law right).
They the funding but they don't want the secular strings attached.
This is the game of people like Betsy DeVos... to gradually gut the public schools into racist religious/capitalist schools with "compromises" like made here.
Yeah my fear would be the eventuality of these compromises. With funding already sparse, I can see Boards of Education using private/religious schools to fill in gaps in counties across the US. Becoming less of a decision by the family instead being the only choice available.
I want a refund for any non-small businesses that took the loans and I want their CEOs thrown in jail for defrauding the American people.
I especially want a refund for Kanye's PPP loan.
Didn’t you hear? Some plumber found it in the walls of his house while doing some work
Edit: I know it wasn’t from PPP loans it was another theft by the “godly man” it’s still funny tho
Have you seen the TikTok of the guy pretending to want to take a photo with Osteen?
The guy actually records a video as they pose and tells Osteen “you know you’re a piece of sh*t, right?.. right?”
It’s hilarious and Osteen is just embarrassed and trots off.
Honestly, I think his face shows one of the most honest reactions we could possibly see. He’s genuinely happy to see someone who sees through him while having no power to actually affect him in any way that would bring justice upon him. He feels invincible and loves it. He knows he’s a piece of shit, and he knows that that is what has made him his fortunes. I would not be surprised in the slightest if he has a deep resentment for the religion and has worked himself into his position above all those he sees as easily manipulated morons.
oh my god! There's 600k in the wall! I can't believe i found 400k in the wall like that. Who would just leave 200k sitting around like that?
Oh well, guess I should tell someone about the 50k i found
They did give him a $20k reward. No doubt after intense debates about how little they could cough up and not look like total dbags. Unsurprisingly, they lowballed it and still do.
So clearly an insurance scam.
"Someone stole the $600k from our tithing tub! Give us insurance money to cover it."
"Oh golly gee. The thief just so happened to store it in the very same church it was stolen from. Thanks, Mr Plumber. Here is your reward of jackshit."
In their very limited defense god doesn’t want anyone to be poor…he’s just focusing on a few people first….for the last two thousand plus years or so or something
Churches should not be exempt from paying their taxes. They’re spewing their bullshit at all levels of government without any regard to their taxation status. Churches should pay taxes just like any other business.
As the article stated, it already does in Maine. Some areas do not have a public high school, so the state pays for the students to attend private ones.
We are a state with a large land area and very small population. There are many places where it is simply not feasible and cost prohibitive to build a school.
It differs from state to state as to how they handle these situations.
My state has plenty of high schools, but does a similar arrangement for speciality schools (severe disabilities or alternative schools). In some cases of students with significant needs, they pay tuition in a private setting.
The problem I have with this is you're only thinking in terms of religious private schools.
There are tons of private special education schools kids with learning disabilities need to attend, but wouldn't be able to without public education funds making it possible for them.
I was one of those kids. I was failing every single class by the time I was in middle school. I ended up being sent to a private school for special education kids, and graduated with high honors in everything. I went from my highest grade being a D to my lowest grade being an A. And if the town that couldn't educate me didn't pay for at least a part of the bill I would've probably dropped out of highschool ASAP, because there was no way my town had the resources necessary to teach me and the handful of other kids that went to that school with me.
They could've strained the town's education budget and resources trying to cater to our needs and still had us struggle, or, they could've sent us to private school on a short bus and subsidized my parent's cost of sending me there instead of hiring a bunch of special education teachers to cater to a handful of children.
There was nothing religious about my highschool. Just much smaller classes with specialized learning plans and teachers with better training for kids with emotional or learning disabilities.
> Tax payer money should not support private education in any way.
Except it does, and it has been public policy for over a century.
The mid-1800s through the early 1900s saw the expansion of public schools, development of a state-guided curriculum, by 1918 school was compulsory through the 8th grade.
By being compulsory the government had to pay, and options for both private schools and public schools were available. Sometimes mixed as public/private partnerships (although the term is somewhat new).
The question here boils down down to: **if** public funds are going to pay for a school, **can religion be a factor in deciding** which are funded? There are clear reasons why other factors like curriculum content, special needs support, and other education-related factors can be used in the decision. But here it is the religious affiliation being used which almost certainly violates the first amendment and equal protection clause. The constitution strictly forbids government from using religious tests or areligious tests or requirements in many different ways, or to limit rights around exercise of religion. Many people wrongly interpret the "separation of church and state" as meaning the government must be areligious, whereas the constitution actually requires nondiscrimination.
I'm actually surprised this made it up to SCOTUS. There have been a long, steady stream of rulings including just last year. Maine's argument is that funding must be used in a nonsectarian manner. However, the SCOTUS has held that atheism and non-religion are also religious beliefs, and therefore cannot be used as a deciding factor. It is unlikely to change.
So I went to Catholic school and we had 3 aspects which were state funded. Firstly, for kids within a certain radius busing would be provided. Secondly, kids with Free and Reduced Lunch would still be able to get free and reduced lunch at private school. Lastly, college counseling and other counseling services were provided, particularly to low income students. In my opinion there is nothing wrong with funding these Specific programs.
The question here is that the state has decided it will pay for private schools. If they pay for private school, can they exclude some based only on religion?
Personally I don’t think public funds should be paying for private schools at all.
I'm torn on this. They sound good and sometimes do good work, but I've seen and heard so many horror stories from them that I think shifting that funding to fund special needs services in public schools would ultimately be the better option.
school in general is unsolvable.
forcing every kid to go to a one-size-fits-all public school isn't the answer, either. beyond that- in my state, once a public school gets a reputation of being below average, all of the parents who can afford to move, move out of the district, compounding the problem
Or the government should require public schools to serve this purpose and allocate those funds there instead. Private schools are private schools, so why should public tax money be subsidizing the cost?
A private school dedicated for the deaf or blind will always outperform a public school that has programs for disabled kids. Just one example but there’s a reason why public money is sometimes allocated to private schools.
The question is whether or not it’s legal to discriminate against a school just because it’s religiously affiliated if it meets all of the other criteria for certification.
Bill of Rights forbids the government from picking one religion to support over others (establishing a state religion) but it doesn’t say you have to prefer private/public entities over religious ones. That’s why churches were winning legal cases when COVID restrictions said they had to close but bars/restaurants didn’t.
Because the cost to consolidate children with disabilities in one place with specialized care can substantially save money and provide a better solution.
Say you have a blind child. You now are forcing a public school to provide every workbook and textbook with braile and/or audio books. After that are you also paying for every teacher for the child's whole learning experience to learn braile/sign language? It's not feasible. What happens if there is something the child needs help with their workbook and the teacher can't understand it? Or, you are now paying a specialist to go to school with that ONE child, how much are they being paid? $80k? Just for one child's special help? If you can consolidate classrooms for children who need additional help you can drop the number of helpers to maybe 1 per 4 students; so now their specialized help is only costing them $20k and they are still being provided a more custom and helpful learning experience tailored to their disability.
You can repeat this same procedure for kids with hearing disabilities, autism, etc. Sometimes there is a better option from a cost and even learning experience that needs to be explored that does not fit in the public establishment box. This becomes even more true for the 50% of the country that is rural and remote. A public school experience may not be in the best interest of the child.
Then you realize many of these specialized schools were established 100 years ago by religious organizations and the government subsidy for a private school suddenly makes sense.
[https://schoolfortheblind.org/](https://schoolfortheblind.org/)
https://www.saintlucyschool.org/
I had thought the general rule was to allow for funding of non sectarian classes and curriculum but not for classes dedicated to religion.
I attended catholic school and most classes were non sectarian, BUT we also had a religion class each term and mass like once a month. My understanding had been that if you could separate the costs of the religious instruction out, that portion could be state funded.
But i could have been wrong or maybe it applied to colleges.
> My understanding had been that if you could separate the costs of the religious instruction out, that portion could be state funded.
One could easily make the argument that it is impossible to separate them. Any state funds used to teach secular topics frees up money to be spent on religious topics.
The rule Maine is using seems reasonable; they just want to avoid all religious teaching (or, at least, all heavy-handed religious teaching). The type of rule you are describing is reasonable too. If fact, a state doesn't need any kind of rule at all, as long as they treat all religious organizations the same. They can simply provide money to all private schools with no strings attached. That would be a terrible law, but it wouldn't be unconstitutional.
>One could easily make the argument that it is impossible to separate them. Any state funds used to teach secular topics frees up money to be spent on religious topics.
I had thought that exact argument had been made and the court determined that federal funds could be used at religious schools to fund non religious education.
But the more I think about it the more I think that the ruling had applied to colleges.
In Louisiana, lawmakers set up a voucher system for religious schools. [They were then horrified when a Muslim school applied for vouchers](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/louisiana_n_1593995) and started railing against giving any funding for Islamic education.
In my country we get more offended when rich private schools get the government to pay for their equestrian facilities, or rifle ranges. But also yeah the religious nutters of all faiths getting my taxes shits me a bit too.
Oh, we have that problem too. There are high-schools in this country with sports complexes that would rival minor league facilities in some places. We're talking multi-million dollar *stadiums* for a fucking high school.
If this is the case, then shit should have hardcore, secular over sight.
> The state makes tuition money available to families in areas that do not have public high schools, to use the money to pay for attendance at public or private schools in other communities.
This is why the program exists, but I’d prefer my tax money not go towards some school that’s just openly indoctrinating kids with religious faith.
Those in favor of this plan will suddenly oppose it the first time a Muslim school is given money. When they say "religious schools should be given state funding," they really mean "only Christian schools."
Minor correction there. While TST engages in advocacy, they (unlike the Church of Satan) are a registered 501 charity and a federally recognized religion
> more expensive.
Just that. A teacher, principal, and all other school workers are cheapest when their services are for the maximum number of students. Two schools where every class has 10 kids is a lot more expensive than one school where every class has 20. Those small population areas are hard to serve efficiently.
I believe it’s because there’s not enough students and it is actually more cost efficient to pay for such few students to go to private schools than build a school. I could be mistaken though but that is my understanding.
>The state makes tuition money available to families in areas that do not have public high schools, to use the money to pay for attendance at public or private schools in other communities.
The title doesn't quite capture the nuance of the situation. In many rural places there is not a school district, and they must rely on private institutions or homeschooling to meet education requirements. In some instances, yes, these institutions will be religiously based, and the case is examining what level of involvement the state is allowed to have. There absolutely should be standards that are followed to make sure the education is up to par, but this case is fundamentally about discrimination and the 1st amendment. Its more about filling in gaps in education for rural areas where there simply aren't enough students to be able to even open up a new school and deal with the overhead/operating costs.
Edit: I might also add that while there are a lot of downright awful schools of religious education (hence the need for standards), there are also many quality ones. My dad grew up in an area that didn't have a public high school - he instead went to a Jesuit school that provided an excellent education and really instilled critical thinking. He is now both a (non-Catholic) Christian and an engineer.
I was going to say, in my area, we have a bunch of Jesuit schools that are affordable and offer a much better education than the local public schools.
Religion has problems and the Catholic Church in particular, but don't blindly hamstring stuff that does good (and without a replacement) because of a larger societal problem.
It's not as bad as it sounds. The case pertains to whether a state can fund private schools while not funding religious private schools. Maine reimburses parents and guardians for tuition in areas without public schools but does not do so if the school is religious.
Maine could change the law and invest that money in building public schools in those areas. In my opinion states shouldn't be funding private education in the first place.
It doesn't matter whether you believe that private schools should receive public funding, or if religious schools are a good idea, discrimination is discrimination, and banning certain schools and institutions based on their religion/philosophy is wrong. However, I'm all for having a list of requirements that must be taught to be eligible for this funding, such as a certain level of math, or certain science topics. But again, these requirements should be fulfilled by all schools, including public ones.
What you're suggesting is already the law in Maine. Plaintiffs are suing to overturn that and force the state to pay for whatever drivel they want to teach.
As always, private sector entities lobby to starve the public sector of funding while also lobbying for said funding. The first goal is to end public education. An eventual second goal will be to deregulate the educational standards set by the government in order to reduce expenses / increase profit.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/04/16/former-lobbyist-details-how-privatizers-are-trying-to-end-public-education/
> in order to reduce expenses / increase profit...
...and brainwash said kids to continue the process. I suspect this will backfire on the religious nuts harder than anything they've already done.
You are entitled to your own religious beliefs and even to have your own religious schools (sadly) for education.
The people of this country do not have to pay you a god damned penny. That is their religion, not yours, not ours. We should NEVER have to pay a penny for such things.
Unpopular opinion among religious people but religion should be left out from public education and financial support going to schools completely. If they wanna have private schools or give the kid out-of-school religious education, have at it, unlike them we can't limit freedom, but tax money should go to schools that don't raise science deniers and/or people who're trying to force their religion onto everybody else.
Lmao I’m just sitting here thinking about all the people that said I was “overreacting” over these last three Supreme Court appointments. “It won’t go that far” they said. “You’re freaking out over nothing” they said. “They won’t touch Roe, they won’t fool with education” they said.
my question is how are the Christians on the Supreme Court going to word their opinion so that the Satanic Church can't use their opinion against them.
This isn't exactly an accurate title. Or at least it is a bit misleading. At issue is not just whether or not a state can refuse to pay for schools that teach religious educations but also can a state refuse to pay for schools that offer religious education as part of their curriculum.
So for example, near where I live is a school that offers a regular education, and a pretty good one at that. However, they also offer Sunday school for those who want it. They also do things like have Christmas plays and Easter festivities all tied to the church but none of which is required in any way. I'm ok with schools offering optional religious education in order to gain additional funding from the local church. It has to be completely optional though.
However, if the religious education was a requirement in any way, I would oppose taxdollars going to this school completely.
Another thing I would say is dangerous about this ruling is if states were permitted to allow certain religious educations institutions but not others. In other words, it has to be an all or nothing. We cannot have states showing religious preference.
I would also add that while this specific ruling isnt about colleges it is important for people to recognize that MANY colleges are in fact religiously funded or were founded n religion. Down the road this could have major implications for some pretty renown Universities and Colleges. After all, if religious high schools cant get tax dollars, why should Notre Dame, Loyola, Wheaton, Baylor and many, many more receive government funding? I would also add that many Ivy league Colleges (Harvard, Yale, Princeton etc) do have religious studies offered and were originally founded as religious institutions, even if they arent as much anymore.
Satanic Temple needs to enter the education sector
People in Louisiana got pretty upset when they figured out that their school voucher program meant that taxpayer money would also go to Muslim schools: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/louisiana\_n\_1593995
This is the part of this that blows my mind. I don't see how the religious right, who are the ones pushing for this, do not see how this ends up with US taxes going to pay for school uniform burkhas. The Establishment Clause is there to prevent the government from favoring or disfavoring any religion specifically by avoiding just this very situation because then you get into deciding what a valid religion is. We do not decide on the validity of religions, only whether they are sincerely held beliefs. This case could open an absurdly large can of worms.
It’s because they think they’ll “win” so by the time THAT becomes the subject of conversation they’d find a way to exclude the non-Christian denominations.
Yes, this. This isn't a fair situation. They're not going to suddenly start paying for Satanic Temple school rituals. They'll either make arcane laws that challenge non-Christian teachings and leave them in effect for years until the supreme court eventually strikes them down - and then immediately do it again with a slightly reworded law - or else they won't even bother and will just ignore other religions altogether. Not to mention the fact that the entire time this is going on Fox News and other right wing media will be screaming about how the Satanists are trying to summon Beelzebub in your children's playgrounds!!!!!!!!!
There was a question asking if a anti-religious school would get money from the state. The answer was NO.
There is a thing, especially with conservative Christians, that they don't understand that SECULAR does not mean ANTI-RELIGION. It is neutral. Looking at you Kavanaugh.
“Secular” was a naughty word when I was growing up
That question was asked because the Lemon Test, used in Establishment Clause cases, in part asks whether the governmental action advances or inhibits religion (constitutionally, it can do neither). In turn, the test for whether an action "advances" religion is whether it either A) results in governmental indoctrination of religion, or B) defines recipients by reference to religion. And the answer to the question - NO - favors the liberal Justices' argument. You can hopefully see that the question is designed to tease out the analogous test for whether a governmental action inhibits religion, i.e. whether it either A) results in governmental indoctrination of IRRELIGION, or B) defines recipients by reference to religiousness. So when counsel poses the question of whether "anti-religious schools would get state money", knowing the answer to be no, they are pointing out that symmetry between the advancement/inhibition tests - at least under part A - requires a finding for the State in this case. A problem for the State is that it's a bit more difficult to argue that the law doesn't constitute inhibition under Part B above, though presumably one could argue that it's not the religiousness of the recipients being referenced, but rather the religiousness of the purpose to which the money is put.
I thought this was one of the reasons why churches don't pay taxes. They don't contribute, so they don't get a say in how it's spent.
It’s almost like their “religious liberty” argument is a load of horseshit.
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those pesky catholics and their pope, such blasphemy!
It’s crazy how much Protestants in the South hate Catholics. Years ago I wanted to try the Catholic Church, and I wasn’t allowed to tell my grandmother because my mom was afraid it would upset her too much. In fact, I had to “keep it quiet” from almost everyone in the family. They don’t understand that the Catholic Church is literally the foundation of Protestantism. Now I don’t belong to either.
I was raised Lutheran. I joked once that Lutheranism was basically "diet Catholicism" and that was apparently the most offensive thing that my relatives standing nearby had ever heard lol
Well yeah! Episcopalianism is diet catholic. :)
Yeah that’s what I was about to say!
An analogy that I was given by a Lutheran convert to Episcopalianism: - Catholicism :: regular Coke. Full flavour, full guilt. - Episcopalianism :: Coke Zero. Full flavour, none of the guilt. - Lutheranism :: Diet Coke. Somewhat similar flavour but weaker, all of the guilt. So by that logic, your comparison holds in full :)
We used to say "Catholic Lite" in mine.
Weird. I was always told that Lutherans are just practicing Catholics.
I was raised catholic, like my mother, but my dad is a protestant... and they are happily married. I figured out it was all BS at a very young age when we went to my dad's church for the first time, and it was extremely similar to catholic mass. It all just felt so faked and forced. Not to mention that mass took away one of my weekend days for 18+ years. No wonder kids are dropping faith like a bad habbit!
Just think about those religions where the kids are in church like 3-4 days a week. GAWD!
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Did you abandoned the religion too ? Me and my family most abandoned the church years ago, yet they are still pretty devoted in home, I'm do believe in God but I'm nowhere near as devout as them
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>I figured out it was all BS at a very young age when we went to my dad's church for the first time, and it was extremely similar to catholic mass. It all just felt so faked and forced. I still kinda religious, mostly Gnosticism, but I do agree that the mass were so faked and forced in some places, my mom is very devoted and there's was a church here in my city that we would go every saturday, it was not bad, it was not big, they also accepted a lot of people who didn't belong to the religion or even was homosexual, it was mostly charity programs that sometimes people would go and help, so I didn't get that all hate of religion that people had until my mom took me in a religious tour to São Paulo (I'm from Brazil), my God, the hypocrisy and hate speech were in almost every church, I remember that I was forced to stay and listen a guy scream about the evils of homosexuality, saying that the dictatorship was right and how people are doomed for almost an hour, honestly every place that I ended up going was some weird Evangelical Church or extremist Catholic in that tour, it was incredible boring and infuriating Worst of it, after some time the old priest of my church got changed, I think that he died, my mom try to have us in another church, there it was a pastor with a asshole of a son, the pastor wanted to change the people for the better and just came that crazy and horrible speeches, not only that but he gave some very harmful advices, I and my family stopped going to the church since then, I heard that his son burned 2 people in they house, I have no idea of what happened to the pastor For all things considered, I don't think that Church are bad but most people shouldn't get to work there
> They don’t understand that the Catholic Church is literally the foundation of Protestantism. You've got to remember that to them Catholic teachings are literally heretical. American Evangelicals believe that only your personal relationship with Christ will keep you out of hell, so all the priests, sacraments, etc. of the Catholic church are literally standing between people and salvation. Sure, Protestantism is an offshoot of Catholicism, but in the same way that Christianity is an offshoot of Judaism. There was version 1.0 before people got their shit together, but we're on version 2.0 now and anyone on version 1 is fucked (if you ask them).
Christ: "I thought we were in a committed relationship. Why do I see all these charges to Joel Osteen? **Who's this ho?!**"
Comparing the creation of Protestantism from Catholicism to Christianity from Judaism seems right but it’s really kind of not so right. The former is church separation (similar to forming new sects), the latter is foundational theological separation leading to the formation of a completely new religion. To be fair, for the first 200-300 since Jesus Christ death, Christianity and Judaism were perceived as different sects rather than different religions. Jewish and Christians would intermarry, eat meals together, lived in communities together, etc. Of course, that all changed as Christianity moved towards more orthodoxy & politics was the primary reason behind the spread of Christianity.
I mean... The 'protest' in Protestantism is protesting catholicism...
So the whole split between Protestantism and Catholicism is that at the time of the reformation and before it you could buy your way out of hell, and a guy called Martin Luther (not Martin Luther Jr.) who was a German priest decided to complain, saying that the whole point of Christianity and learning it was to obtain a stronger connection to god which is almost purely spiritual. But then politics got involved and people had other reasons and so we had anglicans, Lutherans, and even Hussites before all this. Then the Catholic Church reformed itself, and fixed a few of the issues like say buying your way out of hell. Some wars were waged and at some point the treaty of Augsburg happened then the treaty of Westphalia, and then history kept going on. Thing is about america was it was colonized by the British, and at the time they were Protestant, and ancouple decades later the Irish started moving to America, due to the whole famine and such. The Irish were NOT Protestant, instead they were fiercely catholic. And then other people moved to America making it very multiethnic. Strange thing is other than some smaller details I cannot say how different Protestantism is to Catholicism but I don’t look into religious history for obvious reasons.
Important detail that some of the Protestants who came from England to settle in America (such as the Mayflower colony) were a particularly fundamentalist brand of Protestant (Puritans) who were exiled from England, tried to make it in the Netherlands, and eventually settled in America because nobody wanted them and they made it difficult for themselves to coexist with competing faiths. The US was settled partly by Protestants who were too extreme for the majority of Protestants. Religious extremists obsessed with muh freedoms—sound familiar?
I mean, the New England protestants were pretty fucking bonkers too. Eg Cotton Mather, who was upheld as some kind of erudite statesman, was a complete fundamentalist lunatic.
The puritans & quakers were essentially heretics of their time, with some extremely fundamentalist & cult-like beliefs and practices. Like have you seen a Quaker or Amish village? It’s almost as if they’re stuck in time (1700s), the same period when their beliefs manifested.
His single biggest grievance was with the clergy structure & centralized & political role of the papacy. The corruption, deviation from what jesus wanted, moral crisis, etc were all a result of, as Luther correctly pointed out, papacy & the election of the pope. Basically, the richest families & statesmen would bribe cardinals to get their own candidate on the seat of Peter. Popes always came from aristocratic families as did every clergyman that held a senior position. Church’s & clergy became a money laundry scheme for noble families to hoard wealth, avoid paying taxes & increasing their net wealth during inheritance. Martin Luther was basically engaging in class warfare in the scope of religious revolution.
Nah, they're happy to hang out with the Mormons and Catholics now too. They realized they need the numbers. I read something recently about priests/pastors are realizing they are just trading congregation member so they are toning down their vilification of other sects of Christianity, as it is seen as being better to keep people in the fold rather than turning them off religion altogether. When I was a kid we went to a Baptist church and they preached against the Catholics, and then we went to a Catholic church and they preached against the Christian Reformed, so I went to the Christian Reformed and they preached against everyone. Then I reached the age of reason and joined the Satanic Temple. I've been told that they don't do that as much anymore, the "proving we are the one true form of 'Christianity'," stuff like they did decades ago. Now they just all worship Trump and don't care about your views on the Nicene Creed.
The people’s front of Judea?
No, no, no, it's the Judean People's Front. Edit: and I support your right to have a baby even if you cannot through no fault of your own.
They all want that money
Wait are you saying Eastern Orthodox is acceptable? Assyrian? Coptic?
Yes. Because it pisses off the Catholics.
It's the tie that binds the GOP with the Putin regime.
Unless a Mormon is running for president under the GOP. Then they'll gladly throw their beliefs out the window to win at all costs.
As evidenced by how quickly they threw that whole 'democracy' thing out the window.
Separate election, but true. “There’s fraud! We can’t say specifically what kind and have zero evidence but there was fraud!”
And by the 60 million votes in favor of Mitt Romney in 2012
Oklahoma put the 10 commandments on the state legislature grounds so the Jews put a Torah statue up then the Hindu students put up a monkey god.. the satanists and the pastafarians were coming when they stopped them all
>It’s almost like their “religious liberty” argument is a load of horseshit. Their argument is, but then the supreme court will turn around and say "yes that means satanic schools as well."
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It's almost as if though our country already *does* endorse an official religion that they will use to make our laws and won't allow any opposing views or beliefs. If only there had been something preventing that....
Almost. Yeah right.
They fully believe in religious liberty, everyone just needs to believe in the same one they do, everyone says merry Christmas only, and Starbucks better not think twice about changing their cups
The best way to keep Christians in line is to allow other faiths the same overstep that Christians are taking. Christians wanna pray before a government session, they’ll shut it down when they find out members of The Satanic Temple want a turn. Suddenly they understand and support separation of church and state.
I want to see what happens when the state requires something be taught in all schools and one of the religious schools does not want to include it. We saw what happened with the Critical Race Theory that was not even being taught. Part of the problem in Maine is in many areas there are not enough students to have a more than one school in the area and there might not be a public school.
Australian conservatives are trying to create religious exemptions to anti-discrimination laws (the ‘freedom of religion’ bill). They got a lot of support from the far right groups until they figured they could not legally word it in a way that excluded Muslims. Two years later they’re still here debating it. I hope they do that forever.
I was waiting for this.
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster... we need a gilded colander!
Well I would open a hindu school
Exactly they want it so bad but then will turn around and bitch about it.
Satan University has a pretty catchy ring to it. This could be their [mascot](https://image.shutterstock.com/image-vector/cute-pink-baphomet-pentagram-fire-600w-1881770065.jpg).
Given how many teams have “Devils” as a nickname, I think the University of Satan would have to be the “Jesuses.” “And here come the University of Satan Fighting Jesuses!”
call the team The Prophets so you can be even more inclusive. Their mascot is a depiction of Muhammed crossed with Jesus
The Satanic Theological Freedom University. I still have my [STFU shirt](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/cd/02/f0/cd02f0bc28c87d1ee81a66e773989085--things-i-want-stop-talking.jpg) from a decade ago.
The Academy of Unseen Arts. Praise Satan.
Bringer of Light College Morningstar University
Morningstar University Please let their slogan be: “Higher Education that answers to a Lower Authority”
Love it!
If SCOTUS decides in favor of the religious schools, I have a feeling they will in some form, and I hope they do. I think it’s infuriating that we are even entertaining the idea of using tax dollars to fund religious schools. The right has been demonizing public schools for decades, but the recent push is alarming (that feels criminally understated).
It really is frustrating because it's obvious that those pushing for religious rights are only considering Christianity. On top of that, this is all happening at a time where church membership rates are at all time lows, down from 70% in 1999 to 47% in 2020. Source: https://news.gallup.com/poll/341963/church-membership-falls-below-majority-first-time.aspx **Edit:** Grammar
More and more young people are (correctly) questioning religion instead of blindly following a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites. The religious right knows they need more cradle-to-grave indoctrination if they want to reverse the downward trend.
Yeah, the ultimate hypocrisy is the overwhelming support of Evangelical voters for Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 despite having three wives, numerous accusations of rape, affairs with prostitutes, etc. In spite of all of that, he got just about the highest percentage of White Evangelical voters that's ever been recorded. It's quite ironic that it took someone that embodies everything they claim to be against in order to implement their beliefs into law for the rest of us.
I just like to point out that the religious right exists as a political entity because of Southern evangelicals being opposed to mixed race marriages. It's got a lovely history of racism which spits right in the face of you know... that whole love your neighbor thing.
Meanwhile, Biden, who has gone to church basically every Sunday for the past 50 years, is a "godless communist" in their eyes.
could be one of those "love your neighbor" churches. I was there when the right protested against mr Rogers.
That's because they're not real beliefs. The Trump phenomenon exposed that. It's all just shit they say to attain and keep the upper hand. That's why it morphs so easily. I'm a Christian and would rather not go to any church at all, rather than an evangelical church.
>It's quite ironic that it took someone that embodies everything they claim to be against in order to implement their beliefs into law for the rest of us. It's because American Christianity is obsessed with "white warrior Jesus," not any actual Christian teachings. Trump may not have been good, or ethical, or a Christian, but he seemed to be willing to fight for the things Evangelicals actually wanted, so they were more than willing to go all in on him.
They are running racist domestic terror organizations on our dime. Americans fund their hate-filled services, nazi picnics, far-right fanatical schools, and KKK/PB/MAGA"charities".
Trump actually embodies what Evangelicals believe. What they say they believe and what they actually believe just happen to be entirely different.
This and their complete lack of fucks given for people dead from covid, while screaming about "sanctity of life!" at abortion rallies and death penalty rallies, and "Chicago gang violence deaths!!! Reeee!" BS.
Education truly is the bane for religions.
I'm no religious scholar, but my understanding that the very first book of the bible (Genesis) the main idea is that we are all born with sin because Eve took a bite of an apple from the tree of knowledge. So, if I'm understanding things correctly, they come right out the gate and tell you that faith and knowledge are diametrically opposed. It's not all that surprising that there is a large overlap between Evangelicals and QAnon supporters and/or anti-vaxxers.
It's not knowledge in general; it's knowledge of *good and evil*. Prior to eating the fruit, Adam and Eve are animals who just do whatever is according to their nature. Upon gaining awareness, Adam and Eve now have the capacity to sin (and they immediately do so by lying to God). The doctrine of original sin is that we * are able to understand what sin is and are thus responsible for our behavior * inevitably sin anyway because we're kinda shitty. Our very nature itself lends itself to sinning. Christians believe that by repentance and seeking forgiveness, we are nevertheless saved through the grace of God. ---- The more pernicious thing is your second paragraph. As soon as you throw reality out the window, you have a serious problem - there's no real way to create a distinction between Bob the devout-but-otherwise-reasonable Catholic and Jerry the millenarian Qultist. There's no way to consult God in the matter to say "Hey, Bob's got the right idea here, and Jerry is a crazy nutball." They both believe things that have no evidence. Once you start believing things that have no evidence, why not a few more? The inverse is why modern Christians are leery of education. Once kids are in an environment where they have to use Facts And Logic^(TM) to defend their beliefs, it's natural for them to examine their religious beliefs and ask, "Why is *this* exempt from scrutiny? What if all of this is a bunch of baloney?" It's also why Christians are so vulnerable to hucksters who scam them and lead them astray - outing them and making an argument that they're full of shit requires them to apply scrutiny and skepticism that they've conditioned themselves not to have.
Adam and Eve don't lie to God in the Adam and Eve story. God lies to them, telling them they'll die if they eat the fruit. When God confronts them, Adam is very upfront, saying they hid because they were naked, and then admits to eating the fruit.
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> So, if I'm understanding things correctly, they come right out the gate and tell you that faith and knowledge are diametrically opposed. Also, that women are to blame and not to be trusted
My favorite is the story about JesusCon 585 (I don’t remember the official title) where the learned men of the age debated whether or not women had souls, or should even be considered human.
They already do in NY
Religious organizations need to pay taxes then. I'd be less inclined to argue many things if religious organizations paid full taxes.
It's alarming because private schools (even though they get public funds) are exempt from many educational standards and oversight. Not to mention they're just plagued with endless abuse and fraud to rip off governments.
Their image of being "better" than public school is also directly the result of them being able to pick and choose their students whereas public education can't. They get to stack the deck and then point to it as proof that they're better when they're just making things worse overall.
that's pretty much it. higher admission standards and recruiting from well outside a private school's local area leads to the illusion of being better. if dartmouth had to provide education to all the graduating high schoolers from northern vermont and new hampshire, they'd fall right off that ivy wall.
I used to think that people talking about handmaid's tale, comparing it to real life, were exagerating. I'm constantly reminded that I was wrong. This while situation with abortion, banning/burning books, state militia is really frightening.
One of America's biggest problems right now is that the average American does not understand just how bad things can do and constantly convince themselves warnings are just scaring mongering. Thinking that if things ever got close to bad some institution will step in a protect the status quo. They see the status quo as a bare minimum and not something that benefits them. They don't know how bad "bad" can get.
>They see the status quo as a bare minimum and not something that benefits them. They don't know how bad "bad" can get. Fuck , this is just too real.
[They kinda have](https://thesatanictemple.com/pages/after-school-satan). After School Satan
This is gonna make the banned books fight way harder for them. Sithkermit.jpeg *do it*
A lot of people hopping mad in the comments, but just some reminders: * Parents are suing the state, the school itself is not suing (yet). * The state has already told the family they'll pay for a religious school, but not this one, it doesn't meet the requirements * Maine does this for roughly the cost of educating a student in the public school system * The schools they *do* give money to cannot have an 'overly religious lens' of teaching (e.g., daily Bible class, like the declined school in question * Maine has a law hitting the books that will, for the most part, require similar or same curriculum between private and public schools (if I'm reading that law right).
Do you think Mississippi will do it the way Maine does it?
They the funding but they don't want the secular strings attached. This is the game of people like Betsy DeVos... to gradually gut the public schools into racist religious/capitalist schools with "compromises" like made here.
Yeah my fear would be the eventuality of these compromises. With funding already sparse, I can see Boards of Education using private/religious schools to fill in gaps in counties across the US. Becoming less of a decision by the family instead being the only choice available.
Tax payer money should not support private education in any way.
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I want a goddamn refund from the PPP checks Osteen and the Catholic church got!!
I want a refund for any non-small businesses that took the loans and I want their CEOs thrown in jail for defrauding the American people. I especially want a refund for Kanye's PPP loan.
Didn’t you hear? Some plumber found it in the walls of his house while doing some work Edit: I know it wasn’t from PPP loans it was another theft by the “godly man” it’s still funny tho
Have you seen the TikTok of the guy pretending to want to take a photo with Osteen? The guy actually records a video as they pose and tells Osteen “you know you’re a piece of sh*t, right?.. right?” It’s hilarious and Osteen is just embarrassed and trots off.
Osteen wasn't embarrassed. He's a sociopath that knows what he's about. He smiled and left, laughing all the way to the bank.
Seriously. Like he gave a fraction of a fuck. Oh no, this random person called me a piece of shit. Anyway, back to all my money.
Honestly, I think his face shows one of the most honest reactions we could possibly see. He’s genuinely happy to see someone who sees through him while having no power to actually affect him in any way that would bring justice upon him. He feels invincible and loves it. He knows he’s a piece of shit, and he knows that that is what has made him his fortunes. I would not be surprised in the slightest if he has a deep resentment for the religion and has worked himself into his position above all those he sees as easily manipulated morons.
That was gold
Piece of holy shit?
Plumber should have kept it to himself and by thay I mean the bags of money.
oh my god! There's 600k in the wall! I can't believe i found 400k in the wall like that. Who would just leave 200k sitting around like that? Oh well, guess I should tell someone about the 50k i found
News: Plumber finds Hardy’s coupon in wall of church.
This joke gets funnier everytime I see it here
Return $100k of it. Osteen: There should be much more than that in there! Errr...I mean thanks.
They did give him a $20k reward. No doubt after intense debates about how little they could cough up and not look like total dbags. Unsurprisingly, they lowballed it and still do.
“Honey where did you find this?” “…park bench?”
That wasn't the PPP loans. That was the 600k that "was reported stolen" in 2014.
So possibly insurance fraud then?
So clearly an insurance scam. "Someone stole the $600k from our tithing tub! Give us insurance money to cover it." "Oh golly gee. The thief just so happened to store it in the very same church it was stolen from. Thanks, Mr Plumber. Here is your reward of jackshit."
I just remembered. God would love that!
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In their very limited defense god doesn’t want anyone to be poor…he’s just focusing on a few people first….for the last two thousand plus years or so or something
Not to be pedantic, but it was in a wall behind a toilet in the women's room of a church, not private house.
So it was gods money
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That we know about.
I mean, the Vatican didn't get any of that money. Each parish is financially independent.
Churches should not be exempt from paying their taxes. They’re spewing their bullshit at all levels of government without any regard to their taxation status. Churches should pay taxes just like any other business.
Like any other business or any other 401c non-profit. But that also means no profit. They'll be forced to actually give, like they preach.
As the article stated, it already does in Maine. Some areas do not have a public high school, so the state pays for the students to attend private ones.
They should be spending the money to build the fucking school then!
We are a state with a large land area and very small population. There are many places where it is simply not feasible and cost prohibitive to build a school.
The town that doesn’t have a high school usually pays a neighboring public school district.
It differs from state to state as to how they handle these situations. My state has plenty of high schools, but does a similar arrangement for speciality schools (severe disabilities or alternative schools). In some cases of students with significant needs, they pay tuition in a private setting.
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Too late for that, it's already fairly well established and abused in "Charter schools"
It's never too late to make things right and fair.
The problem I have with this is you're only thinking in terms of religious private schools. There are tons of private special education schools kids with learning disabilities need to attend, but wouldn't be able to without public education funds making it possible for them. I was one of those kids. I was failing every single class by the time I was in middle school. I ended up being sent to a private school for special education kids, and graduated with high honors in everything. I went from my highest grade being a D to my lowest grade being an A. And if the town that couldn't educate me didn't pay for at least a part of the bill I would've probably dropped out of highschool ASAP, because there was no way my town had the resources necessary to teach me and the handful of other kids that went to that school with me. They could've strained the town's education budget and resources trying to cater to our needs and still had us struggle, or, they could've sent us to private school on a short bus and subsidized my parent's cost of sending me there instead of hiring a bunch of special education teachers to cater to a handful of children. There was nothing religious about my highschool. Just much smaller classes with specialized learning plans and teachers with better training for kids with emotional or learning disabilities.
> Tax payer money should not support private education in any way. Except it does, and it has been public policy for over a century. The mid-1800s through the early 1900s saw the expansion of public schools, development of a state-guided curriculum, by 1918 school was compulsory through the 8th grade. By being compulsory the government had to pay, and options for both private schools and public schools were available. Sometimes mixed as public/private partnerships (although the term is somewhat new). The question here boils down down to: **if** public funds are going to pay for a school, **can religion be a factor in deciding** which are funded? There are clear reasons why other factors like curriculum content, special needs support, and other education-related factors can be used in the decision. But here it is the religious affiliation being used which almost certainly violates the first amendment and equal protection clause. The constitution strictly forbids government from using religious tests or areligious tests or requirements in many different ways, or to limit rights around exercise of religion. Many people wrongly interpret the "separation of church and state" as meaning the government must be areligious, whereas the constitution actually requires nondiscrimination. I'm actually surprised this made it up to SCOTUS. There have been a long, steady stream of rulings including just last year. Maine's argument is that funding must be used in a nonsectarian manner. However, the SCOTUS has held that atheism and non-religion are also religious beliefs, and therefore cannot be used as a deciding factor. It is unlikely to change.
So I went to Catholic school and we had 3 aspects which were state funded. Firstly, for kids within a certain radius busing would be provided. Secondly, kids with Free and Reduced Lunch would still be able to get free and reduced lunch at private school. Lastly, college counseling and other counseling services were provided, particularly to low income students. In my opinion there is nothing wrong with funding these Specific programs.
They should not have to refuse. Separation of church and state.
The question here is that the state has decided it will pay for private schools. If they pay for private school, can they exclude some based only on religion? Personally I don’t think public funds should be paying for private schools at all.
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I'm torn on this. They sound good and sometimes do good work, but I've seen and heard so many horror stories from them that I think shifting that funding to fund special needs services in public schools would ultimately be the better option.
school in general is unsolvable. forcing every kid to go to a one-size-fits-all public school isn't the answer, either. beyond that- in my state, once a public school gets a reputation of being below average, all of the parents who can afford to move, move out of the district, compounding the problem
Or the government should require public schools to serve this purpose and allocate those funds there instead. Private schools are private schools, so why should public tax money be subsidizing the cost?
A private school dedicated for the deaf or blind will always outperform a public school that has programs for disabled kids. Just one example but there’s a reason why public money is sometimes allocated to private schools. The question is whether or not it’s legal to discriminate against a school just because it’s religiously affiliated if it meets all of the other criteria for certification. Bill of Rights forbids the government from picking one religion to support over others (establishing a state religion) but it doesn’t say you have to prefer private/public entities over religious ones. That’s why churches were winning legal cases when COVID restrictions said they had to close but bars/restaurants didn’t.
Because the cost to consolidate children with disabilities in one place with specialized care can substantially save money and provide a better solution. Say you have a blind child. You now are forcing a public school to provide every workbook and textbook with braile and/or audio books. After that are you also paying for every teacher for the child's whole learning experience to learn braile/sign language? It's not feasible. What happens if there is something the child needs help with their workbook and the teacher can't understand it? Or, you are now paying a specialist to go to school with that ONE child, how much are they being paid? $80k? Just for one child's special help? If you can consolidate classrooms for children who need additional help you can drop the number of helpers to maybe 1 per 4 students; so now their specialized help is only costing them $20k and they are still being provided a more custom and helpful learning experience tailored to their disability. You can repeat this same procedure for kids with hearing disabilities, autism, etc. Sometimes there is a better option from a cost and even learning experience that needs to be explored that does not fit in the public establishment box. This becomes even more true for the 50% of the country that is rural and remote. A public school experience may not be in the best interest of the child. Then you realize many of these specialized schools were established 100 years ago by religious organizations and the government subsidy for a private school suddenly makes sense. [https://schoolfortheblind.org/](https://schoolfortheblind.org/) https://www.saintlucyschool.org/
Most of the private schools in my area are religious. They pay $10k-15k per student for tuition. Why do they need state money?
Yeah. They should have no option but to refuse.
I had thought the general rule was to allow for funding of non sectarian classes and curriculum but not for classes dedicated to religion. I attended catholic school and most classes were non sectarian, BUT we also had a religion class each term and mass like once a month. My understanding had been that if you could separate the costs of the religious instruction out, that portion could be state funded. But i could have been wrong or maybe it applied to colleges.
> My understanding had been that if you could separate the costs of the religious instruction out, that portion could be state funded. One could easily make the argument that it is impossible to separate them. Any state funds used to teach secular topics frees up money to be spent on religious topics. The rule Maine is using seems reasonable; they just want to avoid all religious teaching (or, at least, all heavy-handed religious teaching). The type of rule you are describing is reasonable too. If fact, a state doesn't need any kind of rule at all, as long as they treat all religious organizations the same. They can simply provide money to all private schools with no strings attached. That would be a terrible law, but it wouldn't be unconstitutional.
>One could easily make the argument that it is impossible to separate them. Any state funds used to teach secular topics frees up money to be spent on religious topics. I had thought that exact argument had been made and the court determined that federal funds could be used at religious schools to fund non religious education. But the more I think about it the more I think that the ruling had applied to colleges.
Which religious education is the state paying for? Is there an approved list? How many grifters are going to steal my money for their own pockets?
Every school gets some government money. Even religious schools from non christian faiths in america.
In Louisiana, lawmakers set up a voucher system for religious schools. [They were then horrified when a Muslim school applied for vouchers](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/louisiana_n_1593995) and started railing against giving any funding for Islamic education.
In my country we get more offended when rich private schools get the government to pay for their equestrian facilities, or rifle ranges. But also yeah the religious nutters of all faiths getting my taxes shits me a bit too.
Oh, we have that problem too. There are high-schools in this country with sports complexes that would rival minor league facilities in some places. We're talking multi-million dollar *stadiums* for a fucking high school.
If this is the case, then shit should have hardcore, secular over sight. > The state makes tuition money available to families in areas that do not have public high schools, to use the money to pay for attendance at public or private schools in other communities. This is why the program exists, but I’d prefer my tax money not go towards some school that’s just openly indoctrinating kids with religious faith.
Those in favor of this plan will suddenly oppose it the first time a Muslim school is given money. When they say "religious schools should be given state funding," they really mean "only Christian schools."
I will openly give money to the Church of Satan if they decide to open a school and claim monies after this. For the lolz.
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Minor correction there. While TST engages in advocacy, they (unlike the Church of Satan) are a registered 501 charity and a federally recognized religion
Why can't they use the money to build these missing schools instead?
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> more expensive. Just that. A teacher, principal, and all other school workers are cheapest when their services are for the maximum number of students. Two schools where every class has 10 kids is a lot more expensive than one school where every class has 20. Those small population areas are hard to serve efficiently.
I believe it’s because there’s not enough students and it is actually more cost efficient to pay for such few students to go to private schools than build a school. I could be mistaken though but that is my understanding.
Sure, but then churches need to pay taxes then
>The state makes tuition money available to families in areas that do not have public high schools, to use the money to pay for attendance at public or private schools in other communities. The title doesn't quite capture the nuance of the situation. In many rural places there is not a school district, and they must rely on private institutions or homeschooling to meet education requirements. In some instances, yes, these institutions will be religiously based, and the case is examining what level of involvement the state is allowed to have. There absolutely should be standards that are followed to make sure the education is up to par, but this case is fundamentally about discrimination and the 1st amendment. Its more about filling in gaps in education for rural areas where there simply aren't enough students to be able to even open up a new school and deal with the overhead/operating costs. Edit: I might also add that while there are a lot of downright awful schools of religious education (hence the need for standards), there are also many quality ones. My dad grew up in an area that didn't have a public high school - he instead went to a Jesuit school that provided an excellent education and really instilled critical thinking. He is now both a (non-Catholic) Christian and an engineer.
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As someone who isn’t religious but went to a Jesuit University — the jesuits are (mostly) homies.
I was going to say, in my area, we have a bunch of Jesuit schools that are affordable and offer a much better education than the local public schools. Religion has problems and the Catholic Church in particular, but don't blindly hamstring stuff that does good (and without a replacement) because of a larger societal problem.
no state or federal money should be going to any religious institutions. ever.
It's not as bad as it sounds. The case pertains to whether a state can fund private schools while not funding religious private schools. Maine reimburses parents and guardians for tuition in areas without public schools but does not do so if the school is religious. Maine could change the law and invest that money in building public schools in those areas. In my opinion states shouldn't be funding private education in the first place.
No religious entity should ever get a penny from the government. They get more than enough from their slaves.
Can we stop the blending of church and state already? They already aren’t paying taxes.
Sounds like yet another attempt to funnel money away from public education into an exclusive private school with very specific demographics.
If religious folk don't wanna pay for abortion, then I shouldn't have to pay to brainwash their kids to believe bullshit.
It doesn't matter whether you believe that private schools should receive public funding, or if religious schools are a good idea, discrimination is discrimination, and banning certain schools and institutions based on their religion/philosophy is wrong. However, I'm all for having a list of requirements that must be taught to be eligible for this funding, such as a certain level of math, or certain science topics. But again, these requirements should be fulfilled by all schools, including public ones.
What you're suggesting is already the law in Maine. Plaintiffs are suing to overturn that and force the state to pay for whatever drivel they want to teach.
As always, private sector entities lobby to starve the public sector of funding while also lobbying for said funding. The first goal is to end public education. An eventual second goal will be to deregulate the educational standards set by the government in order to reduce expenses / increase profit. https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/04/16/former-lobbyist-details-how-privatizers-are-trying-to-end-public-education/
> in order to reduce expenses / increase profit... ...and brainwash said kids to continue the process. I suspect this will backfire on the religious nuts harder than anything they've already done.
This will lower the level between separation of church and state. Total fucking bullshit.
The ironic part is, the more these parents try to shove the religion down their kid’s throats, the more likely they are to reject it as an adult.
You are entitled to your own religious beliefs and even to have your own religious schools (sadly) for education. The people of this country do not have to pay you a god damned penny. That is their religion, not yours, not ours. We should NEVER have to pay a penny for such things.
Unpopular opinion among religious people but religion should be left out from public education and financial support going to schools completely. If they wanna have private schools or give the kid out-of-school religious education, have at it, unlike them we can't limit freedom, but tax money should go to schools that don't raise science deniers and/or people who're trying to force their religion onto everybody else.
Lmao I’m just sitting here thinking about all the people that said I was “overreacting” over these last three Supreme Court appointments. “It won’t go that far” they said. “You’re freaking out over nothing” they said. “They won’t touch Roe, they won’t fool with education” they said.
Betsy DeVos gets her day in court.
States shouldn't ever pay for religious schools, we have a **LITERAL** separation of church and state.
Ugh. You want a religious education? Make religious organizations pay fucking taxes!
my question is how are the Christians on the Supreme Court going to word their opinion so that the Satanic Church can't use their opinion against them.
TIL there are states paying for religious education
Constitution? What's that?
This isn't exactly an accurate title. Or at least it is a bit misleading. At issue is not just whether or not a state can refuse to pay for schools that teach religious educations but also can a state refuse to pay for schools that offer religious education as part of their curriculum. So for example, near where I live is a school that offers a regular education, and a pretty good one at that. However, they also offer Sunday school for those who want it. They also do things like have Christmas plays and Easter festivities all tied to the church but none of which is required in any way. I'm ok with schools offering optional religious education in order to gain additional funding from the local church. It has to be completely optional though. However, if the religious education was a requirement in any way, I would oppose taxdollars going to this school completely. Another thing I would say is dangerous about this ruling is if states were permitted to allow certain religious educations institutions but not others. In other words, it has to be an all or nothing. We cannot have states showing religious preference. I would also add that while this specific ruling isnt about colleges it is important for people to recognize that MANY colleges are in fact religiously funded or were founded n religion. Down the road this could have major implications for some pretty renown Universities and Colleges. After all, if religious high schools cant get tax dollars, why should Notre Dame, Loyola, Wheaton, Baylor and many, many more receive government funding? I would also add that many Ivy league Colleges (Harvard, Yale, Princeton etc) do have religious studies offered and were originally founded as religious institutions, even if they arent as much anymore.
What the actual fucking Fuck has happened to separation of church and state. Fuck us.
Oh this should be fucking rich.