Another Steve Story... and he didn't do anything wrong for once!

Separation of Church and State?... or 4th grade indoctrination?

I’m feeling a need to rant. I’m hoping that I don’t offend anyone here, but my goodness. My 4th grader came home from school with a letter from his teacher (whom we adore, btw). Here’s the first paragraph of the letter, verbatim:

Dear Parents,
We need your help and support. As we enter this season of giving, our class has overwhelmingly voted to get involved and support a very worthwhile and special cause to help children. The program is called Operation Christmas Child, and is a project of Samaritan’s Purse. Mrs. XXXX, one of our kindergarten teachers visited our class upon my invitation and explained the program to the children. This project reinforces our class motto, “Treat others the way you want to be treated”, and the class theme, “I Believe, I Can Achieve, and I Will Succeed.” The children decided to help other children succeed who have very little. For more information please see the attached brochure.

The brochure is for Operation Christmas Child, and features an obviously Muslim little girl on the front clutching a gaily wrapped Christmas present. Inside, is a letter from the organization's president, Billy Graham’s son, explaining how all the needy children who receive Christmas presents from this organization will be taught "about God’s greatest gift, His son Jesus Christ. "

I went to their website, and a portion of the mission statement of this organization reads:
“Since 1970, Samaritan's Purse has helped meet needs of people who are victims of war, poverty, natural disasters, disease, and famine with the purpose of sharing God's love through His Son, Jesus Christ.
The organization serves the Church worldwide to promote the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ."

Pardon me, but isn’t that altruistic? Let’s help them so we can promote Jesus. How about helping them because they need help? Oops, wrong rant. This is a public school/religion rant.

And I should mention that I really don't have a problem with the organization per se, because it appears that they are out there helping the needy. My issue is with the promotion of the organization at my son's public school.

Is it me, or am I wrong in having a problem with the public schools asking my Jewish son to participate in Billy Graham’s organization? People file law suits over stuff like this. Don’t get me wrong, we have absolutely no intention of filing a law suit. We did however, write a very restrained letter explaining why our son would not be participating in an Evangelical charity and expressing our disappointment that the school would sanction such a classroom activity. We also explained that we involve our children in giving to those less fortunate than ourselves every year at the holidays and, actually all year round, and that we have explained to our son why he wouldn't be participating. We also suggested some better choices for next time, such as collecting and wrapping presents for children at our local battered women’s shelter or for the unplaced children in the local foster care system. It was quite professional and restrained, if I do say so myself, when I really wanted to kick and scream about how fricking inappropriate it was.

I’ve often mentioned how I live in the bible belt of my county, but this is taking it a bit too far. The letter from the teacher was cc’d to the principal, and I’m shocked that she didn’t put the kibosh on the project. But I'm often shocked at her behavior. I’m also amazed that I’m the only parent that has a problem with it. But then again, the only other Jewish boy in Steve’s grade is in another class this year.

Am I wrong?