Posted on 04/22/2006 5:48:05 AM PDT by Crackingham
A group of Baptist leaders called on its members Friday to "speak positively about public education" in response to a conservative movement to pull Baptist children out of public schools. Fifty-six pastors and organizational leaders -- some from the conservative Southern Baptist Convention and others from the more moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship -- signed a letter supporting public schools.
The document was posted Friday on the Web site of the Baptist Center for Ethics, a Nashville group that often criticizes the conservative direction of the Southern Baptist Convention. The letter said it's wrong for church leaders to urge their congregations to abandon public schools in favor of homeschooling or private Christian academies.
"We believe Baptists should recommit themselves to public education, not as a means toward converting school children, but because it's the right thing to do," the letter states.
"We call on Baptists to recommit themselves to the separation of church and state, which will keep public schools free from coercive pressure to promote sectarian faith, such as state-written school prayers and the teaching of neo-creationism (intelligent design)."
The Southern Baptist Convention has passed resolutions supporting homeschooling and Christian education, but it rejected a 2004 resolution made by Houston lawyer Bruce Shortt calling for parents to remove their children from public schools.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...
Gotta love those non-Christian Christians.
I'm Baptist and disagree. I think each church should be starting private schools. They can get all huffy about places they don't want adult members but we shouldn't be concerned about our kids?
It's more useful than public intoxication.
The term "Baptist" really means nothing without another defining term in front of it. I have been in many Baptist churches over the course of my life and they range from churches who never crack a Bible open to churches that are very, very conservative and teach that the Bible is the word of God. But, because the word "Baptist" connotes conservatism and fundamentalism for most people, it's used like this in news stories. I grew up in a very liberal Baptist church where when I got baptized as a teenager, the pastor gave me the writings of Kahlil Gibran as a gift!
"We call on Baptists to recommit themselves to the separation of church and state, which will keep public schools free from coercive pressure to promote sectarian faith, such as state-written school prayers and the teaching of neo-creationism (intelligent design)."
Uh huh. The spin on this one defies logic. This is their "call" to get Baptist parents to keep sending their children to public schools? A slew of antireligous soundbites? Sounds like somebody's afraid of losing too many students, and the associated funding, but just can't resist a little bashing. They've forgotten that they're supposed to be Baptists themselves in the process.
WOW! Good stuff.
Chances are, their wives and children are employed by the public schools, and if enough victims of public education are withdrawn by their Christian parents, it might mean money out of their family bank accounts. In some areas of the South, a goodly portion of the congregation is employed in some way by the local school district, and the preachers do not want anything to disturb the cash flow. Follow the money.
Children are the resposibility of the parents
not the state
and not the church.
Just who are you calling a non christian?????
Well, I am a non-active Deacon in a Southern Baptist church in NC and I am married to a teacher. Our church probably has more teachers per capita than any other chruch in our county, with at least 2 dozen current and former teachers, principals or other education-employed people as members. I can tell you that even the most liberal of these teachers still think there needs to be MORE God in the schools than there is now.
Also, I noticed that several of these pastors were members of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. If you don't know about this organization, it was formed several years after Conservatives took over leadership positions in the Southern Baptist Convention and many of the state conventions. This is a VERY liberal organization, with non other than Jimmy Carter as one of it's biggest members. They will not take a public stand on ANYTHING. I am doing a study on the division of the Southern Baptists right now and I have researched a lot on the CBF and SBC positions and it is striking how far the liberals in even the mostly staunchly conservative SBC have sunk. I tell you it would blow your mind.
Anyway, I will say that a lot of teachers, my wife included, do not like the No Child Left Behind act. I can't really figure out what they don't like about it other than she tells me it really does nothing at all to ensure kids learn and get promoted, while putting even more pressure on teachers to walk a fine line. Basically, she said they need to first remove all of the other crap they force teachers to teach first, THEN talk about standards for teachers... or something like that. I really don't get into all of that with her very often.
As far as the Baptsits are concerned, like a poster said above, tehre are many, MANY different beliefs in Baptist churches and many different factions within denominations of Baptists, but since the SBC gets the most (negative) press, they throw that on there for effect. If I see ANYTHING that has members of the CBF associated with it, I know immediately what the position is.
Take this with a grain of salt, as the CBF and liberal Southern Baptists are a distinct minority in the Southern Baptist world.
People don't appreciate free stuff and after awhile begin to feel they are entitled. A better way IMO is to offer parent scholarships. You spend so many hours volunteering in the kitchen, housekeeping, teachers aide etc and receive discounted tution.
M
South, a goodly portion of the congregation is employed in some way by the local school district, and the preachers do not want anything to disturb the cash flow. Follow the money.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I lived in the rural Upper Eastern Shore of Maryland. The government school system was the largest employer in the county. I call it the welfare-educational-industrial complex ( with apologies to Ike Eisenhower).
Do you think they would have vouchers or tax credits there? Fat chance!
Do you think the local Baptist churches would call for their members to remove their kids from the county government schools? Fat chance!
WELL STATED!!!!!
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