Religion Belongs in the School Curriculum
Mathilde Saget
Haiti
ENG 1430
Dear Parents & Educators, I heard my 9 year old son joyfully singing yesterday, and then I realized the songs made reference to ''Lord O Lord'' and ''take me to Mt. Zion, Lord''. My son said he learned these songs in music class, which infuriates me since he attends public school. On the one hand, it's great that my kid is getting a music/singing class, but I am upset because what's done is done and I can't change the fact that now my kid knows these songs, despite my own highly feminist, everything-with-a-grain-of-salt agnostic beliefs. Do I have any grounds for recourse? What can I do? Isn't this a violation of our first amendment rights??? (March 2002, http://parents.berkely.edu)
The First Amendment to the U.S Constitution is about freedom of speech, press, religious liberty, petition, and assembly. This amendment states that: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press; or the right of the people peaceable to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances” (First amendmentcenter.com). Many people from all over the country have become angry for the fact that, in many situations, the right that had been given to them by the First Amendment is violated. Especially in public schools, parents, students, and sometimes educators are unable to agree with each other when it comes to religion and education. Parents are infuriated when they know that their kids are learning about religion in public schools. This is what happened with a parent whose 9-year-old kid had learned a religious song in a public school. The mother of that kid got upset about the situation, and was trying to get advice from other parents because she wanted to know if it’s not a violation of the First Amendment for her son to learn a religious song in a public school. Some people might think that in public schools there should be no way for the instructors to teach the students about religion because it has been said that there should be a separation of church and state. They might think if the teachers are talking about religion in some schools programs, they are violating these rights; however, this is not true. Religion belongs in the school curriculum because many of the course subjects like history, music, dance and literature happen to be religious in origin.
Religion is part of American history. One can assume that religion has to be taught in public schools because when teaching about how America was built, the historians have to tell about the first settlers of America. All history has a beginning it’s important for everybody to know where they came from, and who their ancestors were. America was a religious refuge for the first settlers who were fleeing their country for religious liberty. Those people thought that if they went to America, they would be able to practice their religious faith with freedom. By talking about that, some people might want to refer to the fact that Puritans were the people who wanted to purify the church in England. For example, those religious people who were trying to expand “the Christianism” to the world, when they arrived in America, they were able to serve their gods in the way they thought was correct, “The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives—"to catch fish" as one New Englander put it—but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct” (Huston,1998). They were forced by the English state to conform to the religious practices that the government had established, which they found against their own religious faith. Because they came to America for these reasons above, one can say that religion is part of the American history.
Religion is part of the curriculum for art and music. Many people in the world, as it was for centuries, thought that music is the way to express the image of what is inside. For some people, music can be the world painting; it explains what is happening in the world. Like history, the music of a country is something special. Every country has its own kind of music, but music itself has its own history that connects the world together since the ensemble of music history is about the influence that all the countries have brought into it at a specific time. Societies represent their emotion in music, because some people might sing to overcome any kind of problem. For some people who know about music they might consider religious music as important in music history, because during the middle ages, renaissance, and baroque eras from 450 to 1750, sacred music was popular because most of the time music was played in church to worship God, and in courts for royal ceremony. The great composers were church ministers or priests (Kamien, 2004, 83).This period is very important for music history because that is when most of the famous people called virtuoso had brought many changes into it. At this time was seen the rise of the church, because most of those famous compositions were for church services. For example, “The Gregorian Chant” is a religious song, but is used today in music class for students to better understand how music was during previous centuries.
Art was designed to represent the image of the saints, some religious people and other images representing what was happening in the societies. Societies represent their feelings through drawings; people might draw a type of image to define certain situation of sorrow or happiness, like they might sing for the same reasons. If the government, the board of education, or other people find it useful to have music and art in school curriculum, they must admit that religion is part of the curriculum, because music and art were based on religion during the most important periods of their history. In art, when drawing some kind of image that they think might be great for the students to better understand the reality of art, the teachers might need to tell the students in what circumstances the artist had drew it, and that might be for religious purposes, but still the piece of drawing is great.
Learning about religion also helps to eliminate prejudice in public schools. Students come from different religious backgrounds. Christian students might want to compare their religious faith to the Muslims, saying that they are proclaiming the true religion or the Muslims might say that they are against the Christians. That might lead to what we call prejudice. If people can not accept other people that have different beliefs from theirs, they might not be able to live together. Learning about religion can be a good way for the students, not only to know about different types of religion in the world, but especially to know how to accept somebody who has a different religious faith from theirs. Also knowing about religion can be considered as knowledge, because it can be useful to understand why people have been fighting for the past years in war. In history, it has been said that anything that was a reason for having a war can be served as an example in the future. Being aware of the fact that religious conflicts may cause war, teaching people how to accept other people with their religious differences can contribute to prevent wars not only between people in the same country or civil war but also the world from having a war.
Some people might think that learning about religion is a violation of the first amendment because there is supposed to be a separation of church and state. That means public schools are considered as public affairs, while church can be a private group of people. Therefore people may not mix these two entities together. However, this is not true, because teachers are not using history, art, and music that happened to be religious in origin for religious ceremony; they’re using them for the purpose of educating students. Especially in music, one can see that when teaching music lessons there need to be religious songs because many musical compositions were made to worship God, and are used today for basic music lessons.
In conclusion, religion belongs in the school curriculum because people can not ignore the fact that America was built as a religious refuge. People came in not only to bring religion to another part of the world but also for religious freedom. They brought religion into our history. Art and music are so important for some people in school education and can be probably a necessity for others. That’s great to think that, but it must be acceptable to teach about religion in public schools because American history, art and music in general can not be taught without any mention of religion.
References
Berkeley parents. (Mar. 2002). Religion in schools: Son is learning religious songs in public schools. Retrieved 24 Oct. 2006 from http://parents.berkely.edu/recommend/religion/school.html.
Huston, J. H. (30 Oct. 2006). Religion and the founding of the American Republic: America as a religious refuge in the seventeenth century. Retrieved 30 Oct. 2006 from http:www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html.
Kamien, R. (2004). Music survey. Retrieved 24 Oct. 2006