IN THEORY:

A San Juan Capistrano family recently sued in federal court alleging that a Capistrano Valley High School teacher violated a student’s constitutional rights by making “highly inappropriate” and offensive comments in a history class about Christianity. Do you think the parents of the boy are overreacting, or is the lawsuit the best way to resolve the issue?

How could anyone teach European history without getting into areas that most Roman Catholics and fundamentalist Christians would prefer not to have mentioned?

The extreme corruption of some of the early popes, the Crusades that were promoted basically to create wealth for the church, the Inquisition along with unjustified treatment and torture, the mass murder of the Albigensians, the Catholic/Protestant wars, etc. — all were significant in their effects on history and need to be discussed.

And they all represent things more on the “immoral” side of morality, so the teacher, James Corbett was clearly right when he inferred that religion was not always connected with morality.

And when Corbett said that when people are wearing Jesus glasses they can’t see the truth, that seems to be substantiated by what psychiatrists refer to as the Palestine Syndrome, a real mental problem caused by people getting so involved with, and awed by, their religion (particularly after visiting Palestine or other areas with significant religious connections) that they start to completely ignore reason and common sense.

Naturally everyone would like to see the world through rose-colored glasses, but seeing the truth is more important.

Jerry Parks

Member

Humanist Assn. of Orange County

If in fact the teacher said, “When you put on your Jesus glasses, you can’t see the truth,” this teacher needs to examine how he characterizes other groups, religious or not.

Sometimes teachers, especially those teaching advanced placement classes, express themselves with an informal candor found in some college-level classes, but not necessarily appropriate to a high school situation.

Perhaps this level of informality was OK a few years ago, but it’s not OK now. Language and how we speak about each other must keep evolving toward fairness, civility, and respect.

It wasn’t too long ago that women, homosexuals and other groups were also unfairly characterized. It took awhile to change verbal habits and awareness, but it happened.

Also, I am a little unsure if the parents who brought this lawsuit are really doing it to help correct the matter, or are they doing it to gain sympathy for their own cause?

I can’t imagine that this could not have been corrected with a meeting between the principal, the parents and the teacher.

Pastor Jim Turrell

Center For Spiritual Discovery

Costa Mesa

What is interesting in this case is that what usually is taken for granted is just the opposite here. In most cases, the conservative viewpoint usually taken by religious fundamentalists, is that the establishment or the teacher has the ultimate authority in the classroom.

Accordingly, the teacher has the right to assert his authority and should demand fear and respect from the class. The liberal view is just the opposite.

They usually regard that the student has individual interests and needs, and that those must be given consideration and expression apart from those of the educators.

So what really is being tested here, is not the teacher or the student, but Christianity. Is our postmodern society so shallow, that in the 21st century we have to teach sacred views of history in a public school?

Although I think that the instructor’s words “were poorly chosen,” and there was a better way to communicate his thought with the usage of different words to convey the thought, I believe a lawsuit, or the instructor’s dismissal are going too far.

Are we so sensitive to the comments made by a teacher in a public school who challenges his students to think a little beyond their church?

To paraphrase Shakespeare, I think the parent and the students “complainith too much.”

Rabbi Marc Rubenstein

Temple Isaiah

Newport Beach