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This semester I will be spending a lot of time with historical works on both sides of the spectrum regarding religion and science. I am taking a Senior Research Seminar on the crusades  as well as taking a course on History of Science. Recently, I got some time to thumb through a book that I did not get to finish over the summer in The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. As I was thumbing through the work, a block of text seemed to jump out at me. The quote was from the great Thomas Jefferson. He was quoted as saying “A professorship of theology should have no place in our institution.”¹ My topic today is related to this very quote. Should theology be taught in public schools?

On one hand, you have those who say that people should ban theological studies. Children would not be required to say “under God” during the Pledge of Allegiance. Furthermore they wouldn’t be required  to have a class on Christianity, or the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, or even Muhammad ibn ‘Abdullāh for that matter. I do not think it is the right of a Government body to tell a student, you must learn this, and not that. However, I don’t think it is right for a public institution to force a child to learn their laws and rules if that child believes in science.

You also have to flip the coin on this question. What about a pious child learning evolution? How about a pious child learning about the Big Bang Theory? These are also interesting questions, because if a child is a believer of some religion, then should they be force fed facts about human evolution? Indeed it should. Unfortunately for them, I think the answer to this question is not laid in society’s ideals of what is right or wrong, rather than the U.S. Constitution.

This debate comes down to the question of the separation of church and state. Schools, at least public ones, are run by the local government. For example, high schools in the city of Los Angeles are run by the LAUSD, or the Los Angeles Unified School District. This nation is one that recognizes the separation of church and state. No where in the United States Constitution does it say that the citizens of the U.S. should subscribe to any particular religion. In fact, the first amendment states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; …” By teaching the laws or rules of any particular religion would violate the Bill of Rights. In my opinion, it could be good to learn some of the rules and laws of any religion. There are good things to be had within those respective documents. However it is also wrong to make a “non-believer” to learn of it too. At least modern science has many of its discoveries rooted in facts.

If a child wants to go and learn about Christianity, Islam, Bhuddism, Hinduism, or any other religion then can take a particular course at a specific institution. Many people do this in colleges today. There should be no class at the public level of education (high school or middle school) that would allow for these to be taught. There are certain historical times where a basic portion of religion must be taught to have a proper understanding of the times. The crusades and the Salem Witch Trials would be one time where it would be acceptable to squeak in some religion. However, it would be for an understanding, not a chance to preach the lives and teaching of some prophet.

Ultimately Jefferson was correct, as it would infringe on the rights of man.

Notes

1. Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (New York: First Mariner Press, 2008), 100.

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I often ponder the actions of humanity and its place in the world. It is the nautre of a history major to contemplate such phenomena. Unfortunatley, I often see the dark side of the subject as it is what society seems to focus on. For a moment yesterday that did not happen. I quickly visited the CNN.com homepage to scan the headlines to see what was happening in the world when my eyes came accross the headline which read: “what is man’s greatest achievement?” This quick moment made me change the subject of my thinking for a good amount of time. I began to ponder the good that humanity has done throughout history instead of the wretched. I ended up clicking on the headline to read the short article – which turned out to be nothing but a report on a poll. The article never answered it’s own question so I figured that I could make a case for a particular accomplishment in the attempt to answer the question.

So what do I see as man’s greatest accomplishment? I am going to take the safe answer – the conquering of math, algebra, and geometry. It is hard to give credit to a particular group of humanity because it seems that each civilization developed their math off of other works from previous civilizations such as the Egyptions or the ancient Greeks. I feel that math is so important to the accomplishments of humanity because without it, many of the accomplishments would not have been possible. Whether it was the building of the pyramids in Egypt, the invention of flight by the Wright brothers, landing on the moon, or the invention of any product. Math works hand in hand with the sciences to develop things like the refridgerator, or the steam engine. The development of math throughout the years have brought on many of the fancy things that man has achieved. It is easy to name many of the fancy inventions of man but it is easy to forget the building blocks that allowed humanity’s accomplishments.

With that said it is important to mention the signifcance of today. On this day, forty years ago, man walked on the moon. This is a big accomplishment of man and if you look at the history of flight it is quite amazing that only 66 years after the invention of human flight that man was able to fly to the moon. Today is a day to cherish being human.

* As a tribute to the moon landing this post was posted at 7:56pm which is the approximate time that Neil Armstrong said his famous quote and stepped down onto the moon’s surface. *

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According to the Associated Press, the U.S. plans to shoot down the crashing satelite that everyone has been worrying about. It is apparently this size of a bus. It had many concerned due to the fact it still has fuel inside and could kill people not only at the site where it would crash at, but around it possibly as well. I remember that people interviewed from news media on the television, were saying responding in the same sense as if it were a miniature astroid, and in a sense it is. It could be lethal, but only to a possible select few.

 As for the U.S. to shoot it down, I think that is a good idea. The satelite will probably then burn up on re-entry into Earth’s Atmosphere. I just hope that the good, and especially bad nations for that matter, don’t think that we are trying to strike them. We are going to notify other nations, as the AP article stated, but I can see it now. We get hit with a missle from some other country who happened to “miss the memo” and take start another war. In a sense it would be funny, but not in the “ha ha” sense of the word. Hopefully this Hollywood-esque development will work and this crisis will be adverted. Sepaking of Hollywood, maybe a writer came up with it as the writer strike just ended, maybe they called Bush up and said, “have you seen Armageddon?” Ok, I know that is a bad joke.

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