US Supreme Court: Teacher who forced student to say Islamic conversion prayer did not violate Establishment Clause

https://www.jihadwatch.org/2019/10/...gG0D6GJN4a1pc6ybPc0FMS9LYThTw4bQXlyMe3MymFPz4

Parents take note: the Islamization of the education system needs to be firmly rejected, but that is not happening. Instead, parents are continuing to entrust their children to a system that is untrustworthy.

“Public schools across America are promoting the religion of Islam in ways that would never be tolerated for Christianity or any other religion.” This is the warning from the chief counsel for the Thomas More Law Center, Richard Thompson. The warning stems from an alarming case in which the US Supreme Court “declined to take the case of a public school teacher who required her students to recite the Islamic ‘conversion prayer’ or receive a failing grade.” The school is La Plata High School in La Plata, Maryland.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to take the case of a public school teacher who required her students to recite the Islamic “conversion prayer” or receive a failing grade.

The Thomas More Law Center is defending Caleigh Wood, a Christian student in 11th grade at La Plata High School in La Plata, Maryland.

Wood refused to deny her faith “by making a written profession of the Muslim conversion prayer known as the shahada – ‘There is no god by allah and Muhammad is the messenger of allah,'” Thomas More said.

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the teacher did not violate the Establishment Clause.


( Funny how non forced Christian prayer was once allowed over the morning intercom but that was a violation so they say to the Establishment clause but forced Islamic prayer isnt a violation? Many of these 4th Circuit judges nominated by George W Bush. This is why the nomination of conservative judges alone was so much important in the last election.)

Of course this case was in a different court before it entered the highest in D.C.
Christian student challenged a school history lesson on Islam and lost in court
The Federal Appeals court in Maryland came to a ruling that in one sense protects Christian teachers from being persecuted if they mention Jesus Christ or the faith in the classroom. The SCOTUS decision in the OP sealed that guarantee.So that's the good part.
However, the FAC in Maryland was apparently asleep or predisposed to fear of Islam when they arrived at another conclusion in this case. The error is in bolded for attention. One fact is crystal clear, the FAC in Maryland are wholly ignorant of Islam. Our courts in this country cannot afford that. Not even SCOTUS. Their cowardice in this matter, and that's my judgment of the supreme 9, is reprehensible. But because they arrived at the decision not to hear the case the lower court ruling stands.
I think if this was reversed to be a Christian teacher and a Muslim student SCOTUS would have taken the case.

Excerpted from article linked above.
"As a high school junior, Caleigh Wood refused to complete a history lesson on “The Muslim World” that she said forced her to embrace Islam in conflict with her Christian faith — and the Constitution.

A federal appeals court this week disagreed, saying school officials in Southern Maryland had not violated Wood’s First Amendment rights because the curriculum did not endorse a particular religion “and did not compel Wood to profess any belief.”
“School authorities, not the courts, are charged with the responsibility of deciding what speech is appropriate in the classroom,” wrote Judge Barbara Milano Keenan, who was joined by Judges Pamela Harris and James A. Wynn Jr. “Academic freedom would not long survive in an environment in which courts micromanage school curricula and parse singular statements made by teachers.” "


The Shahada is a creed and one of the Five Pillars of Islam. According to Islam's tenets once the Shahada is recited the person is considered a true Muslim.
If a person recites the Shahada and is not of imaan, true faith, according to Islam it is of little matter. Saying the Shahada makes one a Muslim according to the Five Pillars and Allah, who is said to know the heart. Having said the Shahada, even as as student forced to by the teacher in that school in Maryland, it is believed that Allah is then able to work with the heart of that one so as to see if they will come to faith of their own accord.
Therefore, the FAC, being ignorant of Islam, were wrong in their conclusion. This teacher, I would wonder if she is Muslim and this was not a mere history course they were instructing students in, was in fact compelling this Christian girl to profess belief. Because Shahada affirms belief! Shahada means, testimony of faith.
Muslims typically recite Shahada twice a day. Once when they awaken and once before retiring for sleep.
Which is something this teacher would have known if they are deemed fit to teach history.

Shahada is broken into two parts. Testimony and Confession.
"There is no god but Allah" (Arab. "La illahah illah 'lla"). The second is: "And Mohammed is his Prophet" (Arab. "Wah Mohammadan rasulu 'llah").

Reciting Shahada makes that person not just immediately converted to Islam but also makes them a member of Umma. The Islamic community.

We all must be ready to stand and hold the line. Everyone must be awake and aware of their local culture. Because that is where we can do the most good.

This is why religion doesn't belong in schools at all. That's something to be taught at home
People hate secular activist groups but this is exactly the type of thing that they are working against

In America the most aggressive "secular activist group" have exampled their agenda as distinctly anti-Christian; FFRF (Freedom From Religion Foundation) . One of its founders is a former fundamentalist Christian.

The first amendment of the American Constitution insures the religious do not have to leave their faith at the door of the public school house.
What the teacher in the OP did was illegal. The lower court being ignorant of Islam to the peril of every claimant that appears before them , from this young girl and into the future, will suffer due to that ignorance.
The teacher violated the girls civil rights in this particular case. Further, I would hope those so called secular activist groups would have the courage to realize that. Because this teacher in her endeavor to force students to recite the prayer of conversion to Islam is actually acting as a recruiter for Islam, which is not truly a religion but is rather a political ideology.

That SCOTUS demonstrated fear of hearing this case should forewarn every Christian, given the student complainant is a Christian, as to where the deck is stacked in matters of faith and practice when Islam is given special treatment in this matter that was found worthy of the lower court in Maryland.

High school students often prepare for their college or university career field of study in their junior and senior years. There is nothing wrong with a public school offering a class say in comparative religion. It is in no way a violation of the implied separation clause in the USC.

That is far different than the offense this teacher committed.
However, having said that, one bad apple does not mean public school students are not able to practice their faith in public school.
Evidence of this is found online when, for example, a Muslim young man during graduation ceremonies left his seat in order to perform Salat.
As he should have been able to do.

There's a world of difference between a student expressing their faith in school and a school teacher recruiting students to a faith.
If secular activist groups are really interested in this kind of thing they should go after that teacher in the article and pursue their intention of conversion to Islam in the classroom.

I want from religion means exactly what it implies. You don't get to force your religion on anyone through legislation or through government
The problem with religion is it has a long history of overstepping its boundaries. Remember the Nazis were devout Catholics

I can't follow you on that because that sentence doesn't make sense. Would you kindly rephrase?
America has known this since its inception and that is why it is not done.
You are free to not be religious however, the Constitution does not say you are able to be free of religion in America. And no law can ever stop any child from praying in school. Nor are the devout secularists, anti-religious, able to insure religion is not permitted in school.
A religious persons civil right does not stop at their tax payer funded school house door.
I would first ask, what boundaries do you believe religion itself has or is subject to in self-containment?

You have conflated two distinct and different histories there. Besides Godwin's law entering into this now, you are correct in that many of the Nazi's, as well as Adolf, were indeed Roman Catholic. However, their faith had nothing to do with the Final Solution.

You don't know much about Nazis @Dude653 many leaders were Vril including Hitler and Himmler.

Well where were the ACLU, Atheist, and other left wing groups in this fight?

obviously you do not qualify to comment on this op

Islam, for one thing, is not just confined to 'religion'

however, force is what will happen if Islamists get their way

WW2 Vril Nazi myths

Hitler thought he was doing God's work by killing the Jews. He literally said that in his book Mein Kampf

Just let one Satanist group go to court for their literature to be in schools and watch how quick the whole religion thing is pulled out of schools

He was Sociopathic we can't believe a word they say. He also hated Jesus for being a Jew.

Nice new pic Bob!

No he hated the Jews for being Christ killers

Which history program did you learn that on? Beside I was raised Catholic and was taught Jews go to heaven because of Gods promise to Abraham and Catholics go to heaven because of Peter and the sacraments. Everybody else goes to hell. Hitler believed the same kind of dung that Himmler did. Like the occult, Odenism etc.

Auschwitz had a Catholic Chapel. As a matter of fact it's still there to this day
Hitler said out of his own mouth that he was doing God's work by eradicating the Jews
Point being. Religion has a long history of Human Rights atrocities.
Like the witch trials and the Crusades
Secular groups exist to put religious fundamentalism back into its cage where it belongs

If Hitler was a devout Catholic he would never have committed suicide Because suicides cannot be confessed to or forgiven by a priest much less take communion or be burried in a Catholic cemetery but in unholy (according to the RCC) ground. I've had 8 years of catechism and 2 years of catholic school Dude.

So what the heck are you?