Baptist Joint Committee Director Brent Walker explores the yearly "see you at the pole" event, in which students gather before school to pray together. It is, he suggests, a positive example of one of the many ways students are allowed (contrary to what we often hear) to express their religious views and communicate with God on school grounds.At the same time, though, there are concerns that should guide administrators, parents, and students alike in how the event is conducted. He concludes:
There are so many ways to do religion in public schools right. "See You at the Pole," when properly done, is one of the best. We don't need, and should not want, the government's help in our religious activities. Let the students pray, but let the government keep out of it.
Read the whole thing, at washingtonpost.com.
[UPDATE: I have lots of respect for the folks at Media Matters, who provide an important service I read every day. But I think Jamison Foser missed the mark quite a bit in a blog critique of Brent Walker's column. Foster complains:
Oddly…it doesn't seem to have occurred to Walker that by holding their prayer group under the "quintessential symbol of our country," "See You at the Pole" participants a [sic] fundamentally linking their religion with America, and with patriotism. They risk conveying to non-participants that if they don't join the prayers, they are less "American" than those who do.
And yet, here's the paragraph he references from Brent's column.
Finally, students should avoid being lulled into a civil religion trap. Joining hands in a circle facing the quintessential symbol of our country, the American Flag, makes this a real risk. Yes, we are told in Scriptures to pray for our leaders. Students should understand they are not praying to Caesar, but to God.
Not only does it "seem to have occurred" to him, it seems to be the entire point of Walker's paragraph: because the flag has been made the meeting place for these events, Brent warns, students "risk" equating religious expression with patriotism, a blurring he clearly indicates would be a bad thing. Oddly, it doesn't seem to have occurred to Foser that he and Walker agree: the symbolism of praying together around the flag is a source of concern (both – I would add – from a religious, and a civic perspective).
But what about students who don't participate, and the messages conveyed to them, a concern expressed so well in Foser's Media Matters post? Why doesn't Walker care about those children? Actually, he does, and he said so, just 2 paragraphs prior. There, the BJC Director warned (my emph):
…students should strive to model their piety through their behavior. Administrators and other students will be watching. Participating students must respect the rights of others to disagree with them and not participate. Others should not be put down for failing to join the group or aggressively proselytized or rudely hectored.
Of larger concern to me here is the mis-representation of the column as a whole. Before Foser's strangely backward complaint, quoted above, regarding Walker's civil religion warning, he prefaces:
Walker recognizes one possible "pitfall" of holding such demonstrations around the U.S. flag:
Actually, he didn't just "recognize one pitfall", he recognized five! He was so concerned with them, in fact, he numbered them! That's why the paragraph Foser quotes begins with "Finally…". The previous four (beginning with "First," "Second," "Third," and "Fourth,"), each warn of a danger in the prayer event. Indeed, of the ten total paragraphs in Walker's column, fully five of them are completely devoted to warnings about the ways "See You at the Pole" can and does go awry, both from a constitutional and a religious perspective. And a sixth – quoted above – is dominated by his admonition to make sure the event is "properly done."
Finally, the Media Matters blogger asks:
…why choose the flag as the location? Doing so implies government help, even if none exists.
Doing stuff by a flag implies government help? Moreso than doing it at a public school? That just doesn't make much sense. It is the connection to the school – and potentially to school officials and teachers through promotion and participation in the event – that endangers church-state separation and makes government help not just an implication but a reality. That's what concerns Walker's column: combating the real dangers that accompany an event that has been found soundly constitutional and is not going anywhere.
(Let's remember: See You at the Pole should only be a student-initiated event, conducted outside the school building and outside the school day. What would Foser have us do, create a prayer-free zone within so many feet of any flag?)
Sadly, you would never know from Foser's critique that Walker's focus, as that of the Baptist Joint Committee, is one committed to the separation of church and state. That's why the BJC fights to keep creationism out of public schools and government funding away from religious organizations. It's why they oppose prayer at graduation ceremonies, and school sponsorship of baccalaureate events. That commitment is why they often partner with Americans United and the ACLU to oppose government sponsored religious monuments, and fight to keep taxpayer money from being used to fund jobs subject to religious discrimination, signing a letter to the Attorney General just last week urging him to overturn the abuses of the Bush Administration in that regard.
It's why they let me write things like this and this, in such strong support of the rights of people who choose not to be religious. I could go on and on.
To be sure, the First Amendment does have a clause assuring the people's right to exercise their religion freely, and without government interference, and the BJC of course strongly backs rights of free exercise. But their support for that essential American freedom is always coupled with the demand that the Establishment Clause remain equally robust, that the state refrain from providing any support, promotion or favor toward that religious exercise.
There are groups, school officials and religious leaders who would abuse the See You at the Pole event in exactly the way Foser seems concerned. They would proselytize children from positions of authority, and alienate those they couldn't coerce. Emboldened by the myths of the Religious Right, they seem to see the community school yard as an extension of the church ground – the flag and the cross as equally sacred symbols – despite the Constitution (and Scripture's) admonitions to the contrary. These same folks also are the first to complain that religious freedom has been removed from schools and from the public square, simply because the law rightly bans government from endorsing religion. Any fair reading of Reverend Walker's column shows it is a refutation of both of these mistakes: the one that says this is a "Christian nation", and the one that says students have been scrubbed of their religious freedom.
