The Loophole
By Mitch Berg
Scott Johnson discusses his conversation with a Minnesota Department of Education official that would seem to support the loophole the Tarek Ibn Ziyad Academy seems to have found in the state’s laws separating church and government school funding.
You should read the whole thing for the background.
The conclusion?
Morgan [the official whom Scott interviewed] commented that so long as prayer is voluntary and not led by school officials, it does not detract from the school’s nonsectarian character. He had no knowledge of after-school instruction, but so long as it was voluntary and the school afforded equal access to other providers, that too would be in keeping with the school’s nonsectarian character. He added that the department was following up on Kersten’s Sunday column with a site visit and a letter to TIZA’s principal inquiring into the issues it raised, as it had done in 2004 following Tammy Oseid’s Pioneer Press article.
“Equal access to other providers?”
Like if I offered to start a Presbyterian youth group for the school’s after-hours activities?
Johnson concludes:
Muslim activists have found a workable seam in the purported separation of church and state in Minnesota. One does not need to engage in much speculation to foresee the day when Minnesota’s burgeoning Muslim population will be educated in separate charter schools like TIZA at taxpayers’ expense, where they will receive religious instruction courtesy of the likes of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota.
What is an opponent of the phenomenon represented by TIZA to do? If TIZA’s arrangement passes muster with state authorities, an opponent is left with two options. One must either await judicial intervention at the behest of some party with standing to bring a lawsuit raising the obvious First Amendment issues, or one must work for the demise of charter schools.
The demise of charter schools is not an option; indeed, for many of us parents in the city, charter schools have been an unqualified Godsend.
So maybe the third option is to take reciprocal advantage of the loophole; the city’s other charter schools that have adopted the structure, if not the dogma, of religious education should also take the opportunity to offer after-school activities to their kids.
April 11th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
And, when my duaghter went to a Christian Charter school, exactly like how the after school care provider (and before) had bible time, and prayer time. It’s not a loophole only TIZA uses, and only TIZA found. I’m sure we need to create fear (like Johnson looks to do here) about ‘burgeoning Muslim populations (btw Mitch, note he spells it the now common use way – not Moslem).
So, they are using something others use.. dog bites man.
April 11th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
And, when my duaghter went to a Christian Charter school, exactly like how the after school care provider (and before) had bible time, and prayer time.
Right. I know of charter schools that work that way.
Was the prayer voluntary? Did the students have other options? (Was it, indeed, a charter and not a private school? No insult intended, but not everyone is clear on the difference).
I’m sure we need to create fear (like Johnson looks to do here)
That is incredibly presumptuous.
about ‘burgeoning Muslim populations (btw Mitch, note he spells it the now common use way – not Moslem).
Moslem vs. Muslim – who cares? Both are completely correct, and “Moslem” is much easier for me to type. Hence I use it.
And while I don’t know that I’d follow some conservative bloggers in calling TIZA a “madrass” in the sense that the term is understood in the Middle East, it bears some observation. The role of Moslem-only education in radicalizing and insularizing Moslem populations has been a huge problem, not only in places like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, but also Turkey, and even in Western Europe.
So, they are using something others use.. dog bites man
How amazingly culturally insensitive of you.
🙂
And I don’t think “dog bites man” means what you think it means.
April 11th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
I think it means, this isn’t news.
My daughter was at a Christian Charter publicly funded school, I don’t take insult in your question, but I know the difference. One I right a tuition check diretly for, the other comes out of my paycheck ;).
I think there is a penchant on the right to stoke fear about Moslem/Muslim take-over. I think that fear is a. overblown, and b. REALLY overblown when we’re talking about the United States. While there are sufficient Muslim neighborhoods to let a very few radicals ‘hide in plain sight’ as we saw with 9/11, to believe, even for a moment that we’ll fall into some sort of religious take-over is pretty silly stuff. Maybe Johnson didn’t mean it, but he creates an image with ‘burgeoning’ that I think is a bit overhyped. What is the percentage of Muslims in Minnesota? Is it even half of a percent (I think not btw).
The reason I say this isn’t that we couldn’t have continued Muslim populaiton growth, but becuase historically there have been nearly zero ‘hostile takeovers’ of any country once it had adopted one of the ‘modern’ mono-theistic religions. Islam moved into the sphere dominated by Zorastrian or other older religions. It didn’t, generally, replace Christianity or Judaism by force. Forced conversions of monotheistic religions (and in the case of India – polytheistic) has been bloody, brutal, and very nearly universally a dismal failure. Even in the Holy Lands, Islam may have controlled the region, but Jews and Coptics remained, and were by and large, NOT converted, and that was in an era and time where Islam dominated the population and politics.
In Europe, and even moreso here, Islam is a miniscule religion. If we want to talk about insensitivity (and I know you were joking, and I mostly am) suggesting that a religious school is at least ‘at risk’ for teaching radicalism which would support terorrism is a bit presumptuous too. We have no evidence whatsoever of this school’s sympathies toward Wahabism, now do we?
April 11th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
“It didn’t, generally, replace Christianity or Judaism by force.”
“Man bites dog”
Please explain both, Peev.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
This is a big deal! If that turns into the official Department finding on this, then any “church-state” argument against vouchers ceases to hold water. Indeed, such a challenge to the Milwaukee program was refuted by the courts, saying (I paraphrase), “so long as the secular purpose of the schools is met [that is the kids get their 3Rs, etc] there is no restriction on what else the school may offer.” Let’s have those vouchers!
April 11th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
I spent some time talking to some brit soldiers who where going back to Afghanistan. We were all highly concerned when they return to the UK they would be going back to a muslim country. When I said that, they told me me horror stories about the sublimation that English culture was suffering, r.e.islamic culture. Peev, I think you need to talk to some Europeans to get first hand opinions.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:45 pm
Badda,
I explained what I’ve generally taken both to mean. Dog bites man is the inverse of Man bites Dog. Meaning, the latter is news, the former, not.
The second, is that attempts at forced conversions have been very unsuccesful, historically. In the Balkans, it was forcefully resisted, and generally failed. In the Holy Lands, the Muslims were FAR more tolerant than the Christians, the former had a draconian pole tax, while the latter just murdered the ‘pagans’ (muslims) without remorse or regret.
In India, the Muslim invasion penetrated to the middle of the sub-continent, and then spent 600 years being violently opposed, ultimately failing – and bringing about the creation of Pakistan.
I think that’s reasonably fair – and reasonably accurate. Forced conversions are both rare, and pretty hard to accomplish. Certianly in a country where it’s not even close to a significant population percentage, the risk isn’t even that they’d forcably convert or take over the country, I think the likelyhood of there being forcible conversions of anyone are just laughably remote.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
“…historically there have been nearly zero ‘hostile takeovers’ of any country once it had adopted one of the ‘modern’ mono-theistic religions. Islam moved into the sphere dominated by Zorastrian or other older religions. It didn’t, generally, replace Christianity or Judaism by force.”
Is Hagia Sophia still a Christian church? Asia minor, Syria, Egypt, Libya,etc. are historically Christian countries. I think history proves you wrong here Peev.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
Peev, you fool, where is the man bites dog story?
😆
April 11th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
…and you need to rethink the Islamic use of forced conversions.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Bill, I know there is some real radicalism afoot in the UK, but soldiers being afraid of going back to a ‘muslim’ country is hyperventilation on their part.
I read recently about a story that “Mohammed” is now the most common name in Britain. When I read further, it was in fact a retelling of the fact that “Mohammad” was now the 2ND most common name for male babies in 2005 (or 6 – I don’t recall). That said, Mohammad is an honorific, a name given universally, while the 2nd name for the boy is the one he uses. By the way, guess how many babies we’re talking about, oh, it was about 1400. At 1400 a year, it will take somewhere near 1000 years for the muslims to ‘take over’ England, but let’s get our undies in a twist.
Englad has a muslim population of 5% if memory serves, less than Frances 7%. Yes, Europe is experiencing a large Muslim influx, and has low birth rates among caucasians. The muslims in Europe, like here, are financially less enfranchised. The Paris protests were about economic opportunity, not attempts to violently convert anyone.
The larger story is how easily all of you accept this ‘manifest threat’. As I said, there is just little (if any) historical support for this phobia you all seem ready to embrace so easily. Tom Bernard was the source of the ‘most common’ name story – he readily retold it, without checking the facts or giving it perspective. – btw, Tom Bernard is a neo-con who also happens to be THE most popular media personality in the twin cities. (so much for lefty dominance of MSM – KQRS is hands down the ratings giant in town.. but I digress).
Look, there is a small risk of radicalism here. The biggest challenge is that islam has no ‘governing’ authority to excommunicate assholes like Bin Laden. The basic religion is no more AND NO LESS a proponent of violence than is Christianity – despite what you may have read or heard… but it suffers from a lack of control. ANY fool who wants can take up the title of Imam and start prostelitizing, and that’s kind of a problem. We have some similar loons here, but at least we have things like the Southern Baptist Council, or the Episcopal Bishops, or the Catholic Church, to denounce anyone mainstream.. That said, we have Fred Phelps still.
The real point though is, this is hysteria not warranted by history.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
Bill, Syria was NOT an historically Christian country, and I doubt you could prove that Turkey was predominantly so. I didn’t say it has NEVER happened, btw, I said it’s rare, bloody, and has been largely unsuccesful.
I am aware that Turkey was part of the Byzantine empire, I’m also aware it was concured by Ottoman Turks who were NOT Christians, who DISPLACED those who lived there, those who lived there fled. That said, that’s probably the closest you could come to violent conversion being successful. And it was violently opposed in the Balkans for 1000 years.
Badda, I am sorry, your comments are too terse to make sense. I called Mitch’s post ‘man bites dog’ because use of the loophole predated TIZA, was done by Christian charters first.. get it?
April 11th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Sorry Bill, should have looked, none of Lybia, Egypt, or Syria were predominantly Christian at any point – they were nations subjegated by Rome then Byzantium- but neither exterminated the base religions of the area. Mohammad appeared circa 620 a.d., and islam swept through the area in 200 years. Yet, Coptics were in place in Egypt, Lybia, Syria, even after the islamic revolution. There simply isn’t sufficient evidence to suggest these nations were predominantly Christian, or that the muslims FORCED them to convert.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Peev, is your opinion of say Britain based upon any conversation with Brits or just your opinion? If just your opinion, then this is akin to telling someone who tells you their house is burning that they are wrong because you can’t smell the smoke.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Bill, I have two fairly close friends who live in britain (and of course, are british)… but frankly Bill, you certainly could come to the opinion I have by reading emperical data, studying more broad evidence. One failing both sides have is trying to use anecdote as evidence. In rebuttal, your point is akin to saying that if two or three people see smoke, the whole country is on fire. The far better judge is using fairly derived research to determine the level of change.
BTW – just to be clear – I think there is some risk of radicalism in Europe – I said so… I just think fears of violent take-over and forced conversions are silly.
But, candidly, I’d rather talk to the point at hand – what would any of us say are the limits of faith we’d LIKE to see in school?
I would like to see silent prayer allowed,
I would like to see Christmas (or frankly, I’d rather see Easter) celebrations allowed
I’d also like to see Islamic or Jewish celebrations allowed, just none can be school sponsored, not because I actually oppose it, but if we fund Christain (or Jewish), then it’s pretty hard to not fund Wiccan or Shinto – I don’t have anything against Wiccans – ok, well maybe I do – but I don’t think we can afford to fund 100 religious services per holiday cycle, per year.
I’d like to see God as an acceptable term – it doesn’t point to which God, it just points to a higher power we’d all like to believe in/Do believe in.
I think that such a position and balance can be found.
What I don’t want:
1. School lead prayers to ANY religion
2. School funded programs for select religions
When there have been complaints by the right, very often they have (not always) been about terminating programs that started as ‘voluntary’ but went way beyond it in practice.. prayers lead by the coach, by a teacher, ect..
That IS respecting the establishment of religion (Chrisitainity in this case), and it’s not American.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
Well the ACLU has sent TIZA a letter about their practices, so we will see what eventuates.
April 11th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
“Badda, I am sorry, your comments are too terse to make sense.”
Then don’t apologize for them… I was unclear, that’s my fault. My point is, that’s not a Man Bites Dog story… you’re a little careless with the phrase. You might have meant something to the effect of, “Mitch, you’re hoist on your own petard.” That might have been more fitting… from your point of view.
April 14th, 2008 at 2:56 am
“Yes, Europe is experiencing a large Muslim influx, and has low birth rates among caucasians. The muslims in Europe, like here, are financially less enfranchised.”
Peev, please explain when “Muslim” became an ethnicity rather than a religion. And while you’re at it, explain what ‘enfranchise’ has to do with ‘financial’.
You do this again and again, peev. You try and modify one word (muslim, enfranchise) with words that do not relate to it (caucasian, financial). You don’t make sense. You cannot effectively communicate what you are thinking to another human being.
Here’s what ‘enfranchise’ means:
The phrase ‘financially less enfranchised” makes no more sense than “financially less speechified”.