Is having Bibles in public schools really so bad? It can be, depending upon the motives of those involved and what else they might want. If public schools add religious scriptures to their libraries, they should do so carefully and thoughtfully.

Orange Tangerine about local man looking to donate Bibles (but no other religious texts) to the elementary school's library:

Fortunately, the superintendent agrees with my sister that the school library should steer clear of adding any such books to the collection, lest every other religious group insist on adding their books, too. (The bigger threat is, Invite the bible into the library, and then wait for this guy to ask about removing all references to evolution from the library collection. 'Cause you know that's the illogical next step.)

And the board member who is in cahoots with the wannabe bible donor? She's active in her church, and in past years, has had the teachers distribute flyers to all the students, inviting them to learn about the "real" meaning of Easter by coming to a session held IN THE SCHOOL BUILDING before school starts. Flyers sent home in every kid's backpack like any other school bulletin. Can you imagine being a Jewish kid, or a Muslim, or an atheist, or a [fill in the blank] and getting this flyer at your school? Until my sister and our cousin (who also lives in the town) mentioned it last year, it hadn't really occurred to anyone in charge that inviting every public-school kid to a church event on public-school premises might be, um, a tad inappropriate.

Although I can certainly sympathize with concerns about where it all might lead, I don't think that it would be inappropriate to have Bibles in an elementary school library. For it to work, however, I'd say that first they shouldn't be donated — or, if someone really wants to donate, they should buy whichever Bible(s) the school picks. They should also have other religious texts and they should all be in a "religion" section — one that includes ancient Greek, Roman, Chinese, etc. mythology.

It's interesting that no one in the school ever thought that the flyers would bother members of minority religions. Such an attitude is, unfortunately, too common among many who are members of a majority faith — they simply assume that everyone is pretty much like them and discount the possibility that anyone might disagree. Their perspective is treated as the "norm" and everything else is irrelevant.

As I have noted elsewhere, so many violations of civil rights come to a failure of moral imagination — a failure of someone to put themselves in the shoes of some Other and imagine what it's like to face what's being done to them. It's a failure to imagine that someone else's perspective is just as legitimate as yours and deserves the same rights as yours.

Read More:

• Separation of Church and State 101
• Church and State News
• Religion in Public Schools
• Secularism 101