|
Two Constitutional law experts reached sharply different conclusions in a recent debate on the relationship between religion and the public schools.
Compliance with the First Amendment's mandate on the separation of church and state means that schools should not hold functions on any church property, said ACLU national director Anthony Romero.
In response, Kevin Hasson, president of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said that school activities in any religious site - even at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome -- would not violate the First Amendment.
The two lawyers debated at the ACLU of Connecticut's annual Milton Sorokin Symposium, held at the University of Connecticut School of Law on April 13 and moderated by Prof. Rick Kay of the law school.
The issue of schools and religion is a timely one in Connecticut as a federal judge prepares to rule on whether Enfield can hold high school graduations at First Cathedral, a Baptist church in Bloomfield. The ACLU brought the lawsuit a year ago after some students said they would not be comfortable at the church because of their own personal beliefs. A preliminary decision prevented Enfield from using the church in 2010, and the ACLU is seeking a permanent ruling on the matter.
Romero said religion was too important, and too personal, to be promoted by school officials, and drew on his own experience to make his point. While personally comfortable in a Roman Catholic church, he said he understood the discomfort a Sikh or Buddhist student might feel if school ceremonies were held in a Christian setting. The religious atmosphere in the church is the equivalent of a government endorsement of a particular religion, and is forbidden by the First Amendment, he said.
Hasson said religion was part of human experience, and should not be excluded from a public school setting. He challenged Romero's conclusion that feeling uncomfortable in a religious setting was evidence that the arrangement was unconstitutional.
Read press accounts:
Hartford Courant: Adversaries Debate Role of Religion, Public Schools
Examiner.com Connecticut Deals with the Issue of Religion in Public Schools
Creedible/CT at Prayer: Teaching religions in schools
CT Watchdog: Debate over teaching all religions in schools
|
