Court: OK to fire teacher for 'religious materials'

Bob Unruh About | Email | Archive

Bob Unruh joined WND in 2006 after nearly three decades with the Associated Press, as well as several Upper Midwest newspapers, where he covered everything from legislative battles and sports to tornadoes and homicidal survivalists. He is also a photographer whose scenic work has been used commercially.

The Ohio Supreme Court ruled a school district justifiably dismissed a science teacher on grounds of insubordination who kept a Bible on his desk and taught his religious beliefs in class, but the majority in the 4-3 opinion was scolded a dissenting justice for evading the constitutional issues presented by the case.

The majority opinion by Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor concluded the court didn’t need to reach the constitutional issue of whether teacher John Freshwater of Mount Vernon Middle School in Mount Vernon, Ohio, who had taught for 24 years, “impermissibly imposed his religious beliefs in his classroom” because “there was ample evidence of insubordination to justify the termination decision.”…..Read more at....

My Take - You know, this is almost surreal.  Going to public school in my youth the day started with reading a passage from the Bible and a prayer.  That ended fifty years ago in 1963 due to a Supreme Court ruling supporting a lawsuit by MadalynMurray O'Hair, an atheist, because her son was being exposed to an official position there was a God.  He has subsequently gone on to become a Christian many years later. 

This was a practice that went on for all the years public education existed in this nation.  A practice the founding fathers supported.  People from later generations would find that strange and in point of fact I didn’t think it an appropriate practice in those days. I didn't realize how incorrect my views were at the time. The negative consequences of that decision have been more profound than I could have envisioned in my young years.  We have abandoned the only stable moral foundation the world has ever known; Judaic/Christian values, and now we are left with moral bankruptcy.