Missouri Fights For the Right To Pray!

[CanadianHippie]

Yes, but my question was serious. How are they legally expecting these things? Are all courts in Missouri overrun with Conservative Christian Fundamentalists? Are they even legal issues now?

They expect these thing because they consider these things part of their "right to freedom of religion". It's like Chick-fil-a managers "strongly encouraging" employees to attend company endorsed prayer meetings. It doesn't matter if the reality is they can't force someone through coercion or unspoken threat to worship a certain way, they will do it anyway because any law that says they can't is violating their right to express their religious beliefs.

[PennySycamore]

I've got tentative plans to go to the USLCA (US Lactation Consultants Association) meeting in St Louis next spring. I sure hope the Cards are playing at home. My dad was a life-long Cards fan. We used to listen to games on the radio and sports talk on KMOX.

I've never wanted to go to Branson. If I wanted to experience that kind of tacky, Pigeon Forge is much closer.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Branson is horrible. Born and raised in St. Louis, I follow my mom, who has always had a vow never to visit Branson for any reason. Please don't judge us :-(, even though I know it's hard.

Come to StL, watch the World Series Champion Cardinals play, visit our free world class zoo and art museum, as well as checking out the tons of excellent high schools and great universities.

No worries! I won't judge the entire state or even the people who work in the town of Branson for the phenomenon that is Branson . (People gotta make a living...) Even such as it was, it was an interesting experience. Snark-worthy maybe, but hey! One of those "I've heard of [random over the top patriotic item] but wow here it is for real!" things.

There's some interesting arts going on around there too, if you can manage to ignore most of the big-name glitzy stuff. Saw a guy making blown glass objects rolled in smashed glass bits so that the resulting items were extremely delicate but looked like they were made of granite, quite surreal. That too was pretty cool.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Okay, here's what I want to know...

That the right of Missouri citizens to express their religious beliefs shall not be infringed;

How, exactly are they being infringed upon now?

That school children have the right to pray and acknowledge God voluntarily in their schools;

Do individual children not have the right to pray (which is something that can be done silently) and acknowledge their God now? How are they being disallowed to acknowledge their God now?

That all public schools shall display the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution.

Um, okay. They realize that this isn't a Christian text and that it applies to all citizens regardless of their religion or lack thereof, right?

That's kinda how I thought too, but reading the bill it seems there actually is some legitimate changes in there - they want to explicitly permit religious prayer before official public events, for one, and they want to say it's okay for kids to opt out of any school material that might go against their religious values.

Granted, plenty of places seem to do the Christian prayer before government meeting already (at least here in Illinois - my county board routinely prays for Jesus' guidance, not that it's helping any) but this bill wants to make sure that's not able to be considered illegal. That part, if anything, I'm thinking might lead to some lawsuits.

100% agreed with you though that the "ooh, must let students pray in school!!!" is pretty meaningless (other than as a vehicle for attention-whoring) because yeah, there's nothing stopping anyone from praying anywhere they want to NOW. Or as the joke goes, as long as there are math tests in school there will be prayer in school.

[RandomTrivia]

Oddly, the local paper hasn't had a lot of letters or call-in rants on this one (they have a column for people who call and leave a voicemail if they don't want to write - it can be an entertaining read). I don't get the connection with the Bill of Rights display, maybe that's a red herring. The whole thing's probably a roundabout way of getting creation/ID back in.

(I'm near Columbia, that odd place in the middle)

Of course, we are also the state whose legislature wasted time making sure KU grads couldn't get alumni license plates earlier this year.

[Beammeup]

But I don't want my children to pray in school, and I'm LDS. I want them to go to school to learn academics, I'll take care of the religion at home TYVM. It's not like they can stop a child from praying silently in their heads. I never had problems standing in student only prayer circles before a game or something like that. There was a small corner called the meditation area where anyone could go for quiet, but mostly it was Muslims praying who used the area. I just don't want my children forced into teacher or authority lead prayer. I can't imagine that leading prayer would be a comfortable things for most teachers either.

[shrewlu]

Branson is horrible. Born and raised in St. Louis, I follow my mom, who has always had a vow never to visit Branson for any reason. Please don't judge us :-(, even though I know it's hard.

Come to StL, watch the World Series Champion Cardinals play, visit our free world class zoo and art museum, as well as checking out the tons of excellent high schools and great universities.

*bolding mine*

Branson is the worst. I grew up in Joplin and lived there until I was an adult. I went to Branson once, in the 80s, before it was the country mecca it is today and it was terrible even then. All I remember about Branson is shitty traffic and no decent radio stations.

Not all Missourians are wackadoodles...really, we're not. But it seems like the most vocal people in the state are.

[wtfrenchtoast]

Okay, here's what I want to know...

That the right of Missouri citizens to express their religious beliefs shall not be infringed;

How, exactly are they being infringed upon now?

That school children have the right to pray and acknowledge God voluntarily in their schools;

Do individual children not have the right to pray (which is something that can be done silently) and acknowledge their God now? How are they being disallowed to acknowledge their God now?

That all public schools shall display the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution.

Um, okay. They realize that this isn't a Christian text and that it applies to all citizens regardless of their religion or lack thereof, right?

1. There rights are probably being infringed upon because people criticize their religious views. Of course, the amendment won't stop criticism of religion (I hope), but I imagine the posturing makes them feel better.

2. Some school kids probably want to pray at inappropriate times or excessively during the day. I guess this amendment would allow them to spend all day every day at school praying, to the neglect of their school work. Which is frightening.

3. As to the constitution thing, I don't even know.

[FakePigtails]

Surprise, surprise:

Missouri's Catholic bishops back 'right to pray' amendment [my addition: Baptists also involved]

(http://www.stltoday.com/lifestyles/fait ... 0f31a.html)

The state's Catholic bishops said in their statement that religious values are increasingly "becoming marginalized in our society."

"People of faith need assurance that they remain free to exercise their religious beliefs in public, provided just order be observed, without threat of external pressure to conform to changing societal norms."

In the current edition of his denominational newspaper, Missouri Baptist Convention executive director John Yeats wrote that the Aug. 7 vote "is about democratic clarity."

Arguing against the contention by Amendment 2's critics that the Constitution already protects religious speech, Yeats says the courts have "muddied the water," and that the state legislature believed Amendment 2 "was the best way to clear things."

These statements only makes my bullshit meter about the bill ping even more than before.

[ShadowyOne]

*bolding mine*

Branson is the worst. I grew up in Joplin and lived there until I was an adult. I went to Branson once, in the 80s, before it was the country mecca it is today and it was terrible even then. All I remember about Branson is shitty traffic and no decent radio stations.

Not all Missourians are wackadoodles...really, we're not. But it seems like the most vocal people in the state are.

There was a family reunion of my mom's family in Branson when I was in high school or college, and I adamantly did not want to go, and my dad teased me that I should go to do an anthropological investigation, i.e. measuring skull sizes or something. Blech. That aside, St. Louis has its merits, but I'm not writing to be a Missouri apologist. I did vote "no" on this a few hours ago, and told my headship how he should vote on it, as well. He has the "right" sentiments, but just isn't as politically active or well-informed as I am, so relies on me to tell him when/what ballot measures are important, and trusts my judgement and extensive research on them. The polls just closed, and I am closely following the local news to see how things turn out. Whether or not you think we're backwards here, please hope for us that we're not backwards enough for this to pass, Hive!

[ShadowyOne]

Been following fairly closely, and so far, "yes" votes have 85%. Just hoping that it will be successfully challenged in court, as is predicted.

[RandomTrivia]

Hey, another FJer in CoMo! The little liberal waystation between KC and StL.

I'm not really surprised that it passed, honestly. (I am surprised that it didn't come up last weekend at dinner with my in-laws, who are really conservative Catholics. I avoid politics with them.) I voted against it, but I'm outnumbered by family, who I'm sure voted for it. I can only hope that the school-related section leads to some lawsuits that get this mess tossed out somehow. I can see it making science classes a crazy mess, and our science education isn't doing that well as it is.

[fundie_junkie]

KCMO right here! I'm not surprised this passed. Hopefully it all blows up in their faces and is overturned.

[FrancineFishpaw]

KenMO (Kennett) here! Well, born and raised anyway. Haven't lived there since 1985. Leave MO alone! They need something to do. Can't ride the Cards coattails all year round! ;) Oh and BTW; Welcome Tigers to the SEC! MIZZOOUUUUURAH!

Edited due to pointless and off topic plugs, but they made it in anyway...... :roll:

[Haligh the Liar]

Now I want to have an FJ get together for Missouri FJers! We can take a field trip to stalk the Maxwells, or I would just be happy to host at my place, where we could drink booze, Pepsi, or both, eat all we wanted, and share heathen stories of debauchery.

[nolongerIFBx]

Random Trivia, I'm in CoMo! Represent!

So, it passed. Great. Private, individual prayer is already legal in public schools, this just gives people a chance to pretend to be persecuted.

I'm kind of surprised by the Catholic bishops getting so in to it, because so many Catholic kids go to Catholic school, especially in St. Louis.

Also in CoMO- may be a student of yours this fall. . . (Actually, I probably will be taking sociology of the family, but I don't think you're the prof).

[MalibusLove]

Oooooh, I want in on this party, too! I'm a Mizzou student also, and although my sociology needs are already met, I'm always interested in making new friends around town! :D

Edited to add that my post count is too low to use the PM feature... Not sure if people can PM me or not, but if so, I'd love it!

[nolongerIFBx]

Damn it! I generally teach Soc of the Family in the spring. I'm teaching Intro in the fall. Either way, we should have an MUFJ meet up! Send me a PM if you want my office info and everything.

A MU FJ meeting would be kindof interesting!

[MalibusLove]

I have a busy couple of days ahead of me, but I'm down to meet whenever and wherever after Tuesday. I think it would be really neat to get to know some people who are like-minded, I'm an older student who came back to MU after taking some time off for life craziness (I'm 29, lol), and I feel like I don't have anything in common with my classmates most of the time. nolonger, feel free to PM me your info so I can find you on Facebook or something, would love to chat!

[Rosa]

I love St Louis & KCMO (my inlaws live right outside of us so we take occasional kid-free vacations there), but don't kid yourself: the fundies that actually get a hearing in government are mostly living in the nice suburbs of KC and ST Louis.