More than 100 chaplains signed a letter urging local Texas school boards to vote against putting chaplains in public schools, calling efforts to enlist religious counselors in public classrooms “harmful” to students and families.
The letter was issued just days before a bill allowing public schools to hire school chaplains becomes law in Texas, the first state in the country to pass such a measure. The legislation, which had been pushed by activists associated with Christian nationalism, gives the state’s nearly 1,200 school boards until March 1 of next year to vote on whether to employ chaplains.
The letter was organized by the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and Interfaith Alliance as well as the local advocacy group Texas Impact.
The chaplains who signed the letter, released Tuesday, bemoaned the lack of standards for potential school chaplains aside from background checks, contrasting it with the extensive training required for health-care and military chaplains.
“Because of our training and experience, we know that chaplains are not a replacement for school counselors or safety measures in our public schools, and we urge you to reject this flawed policy option: It is harmful to our public schools and the students and families they serve,” the letter reads.
Although chaplains who operate in multifaith environments are generally barred from proselytizing, the Texas bill, SB 763, outlined no such restriction, leaving each school district to answer the question on its own.
Can’t wait for the Satanic Temple to get their people in public schools as chaplains.
But no school district in Texas who stupidly thinks that chaplains should work in public schools would knowingly hire Satanists when there are probably many Christian denomination chaplains available.
Different story if the only applicant is a Satanist, but the district just declares the search as failed without interviewing the Satanist. Then it’s a matter of religious discrimination in the hiring process for that one individual.
I can’t think of any situation in which the actual chaplain at any given school could challenge this law to the point it starts moving through the courts.
To get into the court system, some parents are going to have to sue. I’m predicting a Jewish family, Muslim family, or Bahai family raising suit after the WASP chaplain starts evangelizing to the non-believers.
So separation of church and state can just be ignored now? Can I be a teacher as a satanic Chaplin in Texas? Hang some sweet Baphomet posters and tech kids to Thibodeau rationally and not blindly follow authority figures?
It’s freedom to force Christianity on everyone when the Republicans are in charge.
Stop voting for Republicans, they don’t believe in our democracy.
And I can be a wiccan chaplain and hang up pentagrams?
Up until this Supreme Court, as I’m sure you know, this was considered a full violation of the First Amendment and enforcement of the law could be expected. In the same exact way that Roe v. Wade was actually about the right to privacy as defined by the 14th Amendment, and in the end state-enforced abortion bans didn’t stand up to constitutional examination. Then, anyway.
But that was before THIS Supreme Court, and before this court decided to selectively redefine the US Constitution and legal precedent and existing case law in all kinds of novel ways.
So yeah, separation of church and state is now just being ignored, because the assholes ignoring it are full of “Well, what are YOU gonna do about it?” and the Supreme Court is now all “Not a goddamned thing, homie.” And then John Roberts will write yet another mewling op-ed for WaPo about how people just don’t respect the legitimacy of the court like they used to and how committed the justices are to ethical behavior and how justices need no oversight at all because they’re justices and couldn’t possibly be corrupt, and we will continue to watch as they continue to dismantle the foundations of our country right out from underneath us.
I am a trained chaplain, currently practicing in a hospital. I absolutely agree with the chaplains who signed this letter.While we are trained to help people in spiritual and/or emotional crisis, we are specifically trained not to give people advice. Rather, we are trained to help people recognize what they are feeling, have each person feel heard and understood, and to use the helpful parts of a person’s theology to bring about emotional/spirit healing.
What this also fails to mention is that chaplains are not inherently christian. I am Jewish clergy. I know for sure that Texas schools wouldn’t allow me as a chaplain to participate because of this.
Did you misread the article?
This is a political push to have chaplains in schools, and it’s chaplains who are opposing it.
What are you referring to?
Texas really screwing the pooch these days.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
The legislation, which had been pushed by activists associated with Christian nationalism, gives the state’s nearly 1,200 school boards until March 1 of next year to vote on whether to employ chaplains.
The letter was organized by the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and Interfaith Alliance as well as the local advocacy group Texas Impact.
Although chaplains who operate in multifaith environments are generally barred from proselytizing, the Texas bill, SB 763, outlined no such restriction, leaving each school district to answer the question on its own.
“There is no requirement in this law that the chaplains refrain from proselytizing while at schools or that they serve students from different religious backgrounds,” the letter reads.
Franz Schemmel, Texas Impact board president and pastor at Messiah Lutheran Church in Weatherford, said in a news release.
763 made its way through the Texas Legislature in May, state Rep. James Talarico, a Presbyterian minister in training, repeatedly challenged the bill and linked it to Christian nationalism.
The original article contains 620 words, the summary contains 164 words. Saved 74%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
