[djmcmath]

Wow, that _did_ stir up some debate, woohoo!

1. The Koran, in fact, does teach that infidels should be killed. This tends to be kept fairly quiet in Western Muslim teachings, but the source documentation does, in fact, teach this. You could argue "teaching out of context," but there's way too many "war verses" for that argument to hold any water. And yes, BTW, I have read some significant portions of the Koran (in English -- my Arabic isn't so hot ).

2. Comparing Muslim Holy Wars to the Crusades is common, but a poor comparison. The Catholics/Christians wearing the cross to justify their violent actions could not point to a piece of text in their Holy Book that actually ordered them to do what they were doing. (At best, they could point to some segments of the old testament which describes battles, but did not recommend them for future generations.) Hundreds of years later, the Catholic church (and to some lesser extent, the Protestants) are apologizing for the actions of people who acted way outside anything the documentation ever ordered them to do. In contrast, the Koran actually teaches holy wars -- it's considered a Good Idea, and something that should be done regularly, if not full-time. Exactly the same applies to the Spanish Inquisition -- the Inquisitors could not honestly justify their actions with the supporting documentation. The Muslims who commit various atrocities in the name of their God can, and will continue to do so.

3. Evolution is no more empirically testable than Creation. Both are philosophies of origins which find their bases in opposing theological arguments. Both require an element of faith to believe in events which have not been seen and which cannot be duplicated. Evolution (in its purist form) assumes no God, or a relatively uninvolved God, while Creation (in it's purist form) assumes a heavily involved Creator. Ultimately, both evolution and creation meet the requirements for being religious beliefs. The fact that we teach one and outlaw the other is a hypocritical violation of the "separation of church and state" argument because the teaching of evolution clearly leads into the teaching that there is no God. I would be quite happy if we taught both opposing theories as religious ideas in our schools, as "There are several possibilities for how we got here. Some people believe X, others believe Y." What we have instead is the teaching of the theory of evolution as uncontested fact while teachers are forbidden from saying anything about creation.

4. Blue, you're absolutely right -- Jefferson did say "separation of church and state," and with good cause. Unfortunately, we've pretty much walked away from that, as well. We teach all sorts of interesting things in our schools, but don't even think about saying "heaven" or "God" or you're in serious trouble. Heck, we don't even have a "Christmas Holiday" anymore -- it's "Winter Break." The presentation that used to be the Christmas Show has been renamed the Winter Show. We can't teach "Frosty the Snowman" because there's some vague reference to kindness associated with a particular season, which may remind someone of Christmas, which may remind someone of God, in some vague way, which makes school administrators uncomfortable. Yoga lessons taught by the local Buddhist temple are perfectly acceptable. Muslim day is just fine. The environmentalists (who have some good points, but often go too far) may come in and teach our children that the life of an animal is more important than the life of a human, and that god is in all things, and is all things. But suggest even remotely in the direction of a Judeo-Christian God and you're liable to find yourself out on the curb.

5. As to evolution and science ... evolution has been pushed so heavily for so long that most people quietly accept it as truth, despite the fact that empirical evidence is sorely lacking. The fossil chain is ridiculously thin, the arguments to support "sudden bursts of evolution" are weak, at best, and senior evolution proponents are denouncing the whole theory. We demonstrate large scale evolutionary processes by claiming that they are identical to the generation of flaws in fruit flies brought about by breeding, without recognizing that such flaws are neither repeatable nor maintainable. People cite Darwin's work without ever having read it, and our poor children are too impressionable to wonder whether or not the evidence the teacher is presenting is sound. People continue to argue for an incredibly old earth, more so as required by increasingly older requirements from the evolutionist camp, despite the complete lack of supporting evidence.




I'd be happy with some moderation, a middle ground. I don't mind Buddhists or atheists teaching in our schools, but I object to the complete rejection of Judeo-Christian background.


Dan