Lebanon, Missouri school board member responds to my First-Amendment concerns with snark and defiance

June 1, 2014 • 8:45 am

Yesterday I posted a video of Kevin Lowery, the principal of Lebanon High School in Lebanon, Missouri, offering a prayer and a defense of our country’s religious foundations at his school’s graduation. That was clearly open defiance of our government’s ban on public schools endorsing religion. I also posted a list of publicly available email addresses for principal Lowery, the school board members for Lebanon, and the school superintendent, as well as an email I wrote all of them protesting the intrusion of religious beliefs into the public-school ceremony.

One of these members, Mr. Kim Light, has responded, and with an unusual level of defiance and snark.  I reproduce his email here along with his email address, since that was also listed on the Lebanon  page of school-board members cited in my earlier post. Notice that Light’s response was copied to the other members of the school board, the school superintendent, and the principal—the same people who received my email. I’ve put the text of his email in bold below:

From: Kim Light klight@heritagebankozarks.com

CC: “dwidhalm@lebanon.k12.mo.us” dwidhalm@lebanon.k12.mo.us, “john@carmeco.com” john@carmeco.com, “keldridge@central-bank.net” keldridge@central-bank.net, “sheadley@midmobank.com” sheadley@midmobank.com, “jeremiah.hough@independentstavecompany.com” jeremiah.hough@independentstavecompany.com, “bob@oneiloneil.com” bob@oneiloneil.com, “jsriggs@webound.com” jsriggs@webound.com, “klowery@lebanon.k12.mo.us” klowery@lebanon.k12.mo.us

My question is whether or not this is funded and/or supported by the University of Chicago and is this YouTube viewing conducted using university resources and conducted during time that could be used for instructional or research time.

Sent from my iPhone

I have emailed a response to Mr. Light, copying it to all concerned:

Dear Mr. Light:

Thank you for your response—or rather, your non-response—to my complaint and inquiry about Principal Lowery’s remarks at the Lebanon High School graduation.

I see that you are not only avoiding the issue, but being sarcastic: raising the possibility that I am using the resources of the University of Chicago (which is, by the way, a private school, unlike Lebanon High), as well as the time I am supposed to devote to my job, to complain about the intrusion of religion into the Lebanon School District. Let me assure you that my website post, the YouTube video, and the posting on my website about the school’s behavior, were all done on my private time and on my private website on Saturday morning. None of my university’s resources, nor the time I devote to my job here, were diverted to what I wrote, nor, of course, does anything I said reflect the official positions of the University of Chicago.

Now that I’ve answered your question, perhaps you can answer mine: was the principal’s speech vetted and approved by the Lebanon School Board? And what is being done to prevent further Constitutional violations in the future?

I have posted my complaint, as well as the YouTube video, on my website, which gets between 20,000 and 30,000 views per day. My original post is here: http://whyevolutionistrue.com/2014/05/31/public-high-school-principal-prays-at-graduation/. I will also post your email response so readers can see the kind of insouciance and disdain you bring to this serious issue.

Please note that I am not the only one upset at Principal Lowery’s decision to drag religion into the graduation ceremony. If you look at the comments on my post, you’ll see that Mr. Lowery’s oration also offended a graduating senior of your school as well as her parent, who has complained to both the American Civil Liberties Union and the Freedom from Religion Foundation about Lowery’s remarks. As a person with legal standing, the parent of course can be party to a legal complaint against the principal, the superintendent, and your school board. Here is what the parent wrote on my site:

“I was an audience member at this event, and my graduating daughter was very offended and upset by this. I’ve already contacted the ACLU about this. Thank you for your blog post.

. . . I was pretty enraged about the whole event. The strong audience cheers are only going to further ostracize the students who don’t share his belief. It is inappropriate and rude to shame students at their own graduation ceremony for being different–intentional or not.”

I don’t think you’re aware of the serious issues involved here. Instead of writing a snarky email in response to my complaint, you should be pondering how to prevent future violations of the Constitution in your school district. You should also be aware that, given the complaints to the FFRF and ACLU, it is likely that legal proceedings are in the offing, and that your dismissive behavior will not help matters.

I sincerely hope that other members of the school board, the Superintendent of Schools, and Principal Lowery do not see my email in the same dismissive light that you did. Such recalcitrant behavior will, in the long run, only harm your school district.

I am sending your response (and this response from me) to the other members of the Board, and to the superintendent and principal; and will post them both on my website. It is instructive to see this kind of behavior from a member of a public school board, someone supposedly responsible for making sure that students are properly educated for the responsibilities of citizenship.

Sincerely,
Jerry Coyne

*****

I wondered who Mr. Light was, and found that he is President and Senior Credit Officer of Heritage Bank of the Ozarks. Here is his photo from that page (I always like to see what opponents look like):

staffKL

The announcement of his appointment at the bank , and a bit about his background, can be seen in the August, 25, 2011 issue of the Lebanon Daily Record.

 

Sudan will free Christian doctor sentenced to death for apostasy

June 1, 2014 • 5:49 am

There is some good news on this lovely summer morning (well, it feel like summer, with temperatures in the 80s in Chicago).

On May 16 I reported the sentencing to death for apostasy of Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a doctor living in a Muslim country. She had married a Christian man and was raised as a Christian by a Christian mother, but, as her father was Muslim, that apparently constitutes apostasy under Sudanese (sharia) law. She was also eight months pregnant. The sentence included 100 lashes “after she had recovered from giving birth,” and then hanging when her child was two years old.  This, of course, is barbarism, an offense to every rational person.

Thus I’m delighted to report that, according to Arutz Sheva 7 from Israel, Ibrahim is to be freed:

Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag was condemned to death on May 15 under the Islamic Sharia law that has been in place in Sudan since 1983 and which outlaws conversions under pain of death.

“The lady will be freed within days in line with legal procedure that will be taken by the judiciary and the ministry of justice,” Abdullah al-Azraq, a foreign ministry undersecretary, told AFP.

Azraq, who spoke via telephone from London, did not elaborate.

The 27-year-old gave birth to a baby girl on Tuesday in a women’s prison in Khartoum’s twin city of Omdurman.

Her husband, U.S. citizen Daniel Wani, visited Ishag and the baby on Thursday, after being denied access earlier in the week, and told AFPboth were in “good health.”

There’s little doubt that this reversal of barbarism was due to international pressure:

Her case sparked international condemnation, with British Prime Minister David Cameron saying Saturday he was “appalled” by the “barbaric” sentence given to Ishag.

Britain and Canada had summoned the Sudanese envoys to their countries last week and told them the sentence violated Sudan’s international human rights obligations.

United Nations experts have called the conviction “outrageous” and said it must be overturned.

Sudan, while defending the verdict, had earlier hinted that Ishag might be freed, saying on May 18 the verdict was “preliminary”.

Fox News added this on May 23:

International pressure is mounting on Sudan to release Ibrahim, including an online petition by Amnesty International that has over 600,000 signatures.

The U.S. response appears to have been tepid, and I don’t recall President Obama saying anything about the case, although it’s reported that Ibrahim’s husband is an American citizen. Fox adds:

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters Thursday that the administration is doing what it can on the case.

“Through our U.S. Embassy in Khartoum, the White House and the State Department have communicated our strong concern to the highest levels of the Government of Sudan over this case,” said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki. “We’ve also joined with other embassies in Khartoum to express our concern in a widely distributed public statement. U.S. Embassy officials have been engaged in the case from the earliest days.”

Ibrahim’s husband, Daniel Wani is confined to a wheelchair and “totally depends on her for all details of his life,” her lawyer said. Wani said when he called the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum in April prior to his wife’s death sentence, there was no interest in the case. He said he emphasized that his son was a U.S. citizen, by virtue of his own citizenship, embassy officials demanded DNA evidence. Wani said he agreed and even provided official wedding documents and birth certificates, but that the embassy still offered no help.

If this is true, Obama’s lack of a statement can be construed as fear of offending Muslims. At any rate, it’s shameful that the U.S. didn’t join Canada and Britain in the very strong gesture of summoning the Sudanese ambassador for a dressing-down.

h/t: Malgorzata

Readers’ wildlife photos

June 1, 2014 • 5:32 am

More bird photos have arrived this weekend. The first two are from reader Stephen Barnard, who lives in Idaho. Click all photos to enlarge.

Spotted sandpiper (Actitis macularius):

Spotted sandpiper

Killdeer (Charadrius vociferus). You can hear its lovely calls here:

RT9A5505 (1)

Diana MacPherson, who sent a note, enclosed pictures of a male and female ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris). Since I posted a photo of the female the other day, I’ll put up two pictures of the male.

Here are a couple pictures of the male (in the first one he is in a weigela next to some cobwebs, guarding the feeders). He dive-bombs the poor girls and I have  a picture of one of them cowering in the weigela as he does so. You can see their pretty green feathers in the dusk sunlight.
I think I saw an interloper male. He outmanoeuvred the regular male and dashed to the feeder to get a quick sip before going on. 🙂

Hummer 1

Hummer 2

 

Sunday: Hili dialogue

June 1, 2014 • 3:15 am

Hili is getting philosophical in her teenage years. . .

Hili: I’m pondering over being an sich…
A: I do not understand.
Hili: When you’re asleep you’re a being an sich, and when you eat you’re a being für sich.

10312626_10203483710640734_4762986460003617128_n
In Polish:
Hili: Zastanawiam się nad bytem w sobie…
Ja: Nie rozumiem?
Hili: Śpiący byt jest bytem w sobie, jedzący bytem dla siebie.

U.S. trades Taliban commanders for solider, and I’m confused

May 31, 2014 • 1:31 pm

It’s been announced in the last few hours that the only U.S. soldier who was held by the Afghans as a prisoner of war—Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl—was handed over to the U.S. this morning. Bergdahl had been held captive for nearly five years (he’s reported to be in good shape). In return, the U.S. released five prisoners from Guantanamo. According to the Daily Beast, these aren’t low-level functionaries, but major Taliban commanders:

The five Guantanamo detainees released by the Obama administration in exchange for America’s last prisoner of war in Afghanistan, Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, are bad guys. They are top Taliban commanders the group has tried to free for more than a decade.

According to a 2008 Pentagon dossier on Guantanamo Bay inmates, all five men released were considered to be a high risk to launch attacks against the United States and its allies if they were liberated. The exchange shows that the Obama administration was willing to pay a steep price, indeed, for Bergdahl’s freedom. The administration says they will be transferred to Qatar, which played a key role in the negotiations.

In the initial statements released about the deal, the White House declined to name the detainees who would be leaving the Cuba based prison Obama has been trying to close since his first day in office.

A senior U.S. defense official confirmed Saturday that the prisoners to be released include Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah Norullah Noori, Abdul Haq Wasiq, Khairullah Khairkhwa and Mohammed Nabi Omari.

While not as well known as Guantanamo inmates like 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Taliban 5 were some of the worst outlaws in the U.S. war on terror. And their release will end up replenishing the diminished leadership ranks of the Afghan Taliban at a moment when the United States is winding down the war there.

“They are undoubtedly among the most dangerous Taliban commanders held at Guantanamo,” said Thomas Joscelyn, a senior editor at the Long War Journal, who keeps a close watch on developments concerning the detainees left at the Guantanamo Bay prison.

I’m absolutely thrilled for Bergdahl’s family that he’s coming home: imagine thinking for five years that you’d never see your husband/father/relative/friend again. What a relief that he’s free!

But I’m a bit puzzled and, I admit, slightly disturbed by the swap.

Lord knows I despite the sequestration of prisoners on Guantanamo, and think they should be given a fair trial in the U.S. by civil courts. But I thought it was the policy of the U.S. government never to negotiate with terrorists, and it seems to me that these Taliban bigwigs are terrorists. Or, even if they’re regarded as prisoners of war (in which case swaps are okay), why do we give up five to get one? What is the right ratio? Should release dozens of people who will go back to the business of trying to kill us in return for one of our own? Do we hold the life of a single soldier higher than the potential damage the released prisoners may cause?

The policy of not negotiating with terrorists is supposedly designed to avoid legitimizing such groups, and to prevent the wholesale kidnapping of our citizens as a means of securing the release of criminals. Yet this is what we’ve done.  I have to conclude that our government’s policy is a sham: an official policy that is honored in the breach. And I can understand that, for the pressure from distraught family members must be overwhelming.  In other words, we always hear “we don’t negotiate with terrorists,” but there’s a whisper out of the side of the mouth: “But really, we will.”

I don’t know the answer, and am willing to listen to readers. All I know is that I’m elated for Sgt. Bergdahl, his family, and his friends, but worried that we’re enabling more of the same. All it will take is a few more kidnappings—even by civilians, and our jails will be emptied of terrorists.

 

 

Pastor Matthew Hagee: Global warming not produced by humans, but simply a sign of Jesus’s return

May 31, 2014 • 10:52 am

Oh, how I wish that Stephen Jay Gould were still alive! Not only would we have a huge additional corpus of writing about evolution and other topics (although Gould’s writing got less readable and more baroque as he aged), but I’d also be able to tease him about NOMA, his untentable notion that religion and science are compatible because they comprise “non-overlapping magisteria.”

NOMA, as most of you surely know, was laid out in Gould’s 1999 book  Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life.  I reviewed that book (negatively) for the Times Literary Supplement, but I can’t find the review online. At any rate, Gould claimed that religion’s sphere was to discuss and adjuciate meaning, morals, purpose, and values, and to stay the hell away from claims about the natural world.  Science, on the other hand, deals explicitly with the natural world, and, according to Gould, should stay away from religion’s bailiwick.

You’ll immediately recognize the two big problems with this thesis—and I’m surprised Gould didn’t. First, there’s a long tradition of secular and philosophical analysis of “meaning, morals, and values,” and, in fact, those areas give better answers than do religion.  Secular philosophy, for instance, doesn’t decree it immoral to have sex before marriage, divorce your spouse, or allow women to drive. (Gould really did appear to construe all analysis of values and purpose as “religious.”)

Second, religion simply can’t keep its mitts off the natural world or the cosmos, for it’s constantly making statements about the way things are.  With the exception of obscurantist theologians like David Bentley Hart, religion makes truth claims about heaven, hell, divine beings, the veracity of scripture, the occurrence of miracles, and so on. In fact, it is on those grounds that theologians and religious scientists have criticized NOMA, and these include folks like John Haught and Ian Hutchinson.

And, of course,  creationism is a huge intrusion of religion into the magisterium of science. But Gould insulated himself in advance from that criticism by claiming that creationist faiths weren’t “proper” religions. By defining “proper” religions as those not making existence claims about the cosmos, Gould at once made his NOMA a tautology, as well as informing billions of believers whose faith rests on existence claims that their religions weren’t “proper.”

This is all a long-winded introduction to this video, presented by Right Wing Watch, showing Matthew Hagee, executive pastor of the Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas. Pastor Hagee presents a perfect violation of NOMA by claiming that if science conflicts with God’s word, the science must be wrong. In this case the “science” is global warming, which Hagee claims is not man-made, but a harbinger of Jesus’s return.

A partial transcription from RWW:

Matthew Hagee kicked off this week’s “Hagee Hotline” by informing his viewers that in situations where “men are saying things that contradict God’s word, God’s word is accurate and men are wrong” … and that is why Christians should not believe in climate change.

As Hagee explained, the views put forth by scientists and experts on any subject are not to be believed if those views are at odds with what the Bible teaches. As such, the extreme weather events that the climate has been experiencing are not the result of climate change but are rather signs of the End Times and the imminent return of Jesus Christ.

“The Bible says that whenever we approach the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ,” Hagee explained, “that there would be strange weather patterns. Jesus said this in Matthew the twenty-fifth chapter. So we have a decision to make: do we believe what an environmentalist group says and choose to live in a world where we’re attempting to make everything as clean in the air as possible, or do we believe what the Bible says, that these things were going to happen and that rather than try to clean up all of the air and solve all of the problems of the world by eliminating factories, we should start to tell people about Jesus Christ who is to return?”

In other words, forget cap and trade, forget trying to clean up the planet and forestall our planet’s imminent human-caused degeneration. Jesus will set it right—and the Good News is that he’s on his way!

h/t: Miss May