Thanks to several who responded to my request yesterday for a photo of the Bible verse posted on Growing God’s Kingdom, the preschool operated primarily with tax dollars by Republican state Rep. Justin Harris of West Fork. Scrapper72 took the photo above.
Harris, and various media enablers, seem intent on claiming that — if a Bible class isn’t part of the 7.5 hours of instruction required daily in return for the almost $1 million he receives every year in public money — he can get away with it during the extended hours of the day. The case law doesn’t agree with him. The argument overlooks the embedded public dollars in his building, the light bill, the furniture, the instructional materials and the salaries of the staff teaching Bible. It also overlooks the daylong exposure Harris provides in the form of Bible verses on bulletin boards and other religious exercises done on the taxpayers’ money. These apparently include use of a Pledge of Allegiance to a Christian nation, one version quoted by a local blog, degeneratedduck, which also posted a photo of the sign:
I pledge allegiance to the Christian Flag and to the Savior for whose kingdom it stands; One Savior, crucified, risen, and coming again with life and Liberty to all who repent and believe The Gospel
I don’t know who the Duck is, but I agree with her or his conclusion about Growing God’s Kingdom:
This is an EXCELLENT SCHOOL run by EXCELLENT PEOPLE serving an EXCELLENT COMMUNITY for what I’m sure are the BEST of reasons. But the path to HELL is paved with good intentions. Public funding of sectarian schools is a giant leap down that slippery slope to American Theocracy.
Does the state of Arkansas have the guts to enforce the Constitution? I await news.