Posted by:
Amyjo
(
)
Date: March 08, 2019 05:56AM
It isn't only schools where this is observed on Ash Wednesday. Downtowns of inner cities you'll see business people and people going about their business wearing the charcoal smear on their foreheads on Ash Wednesday.
When I worked in Manhattan near Wall Street for most of a decade it was commonplace there too to see stockbrokers and others walking down the sidewalk wearing the smudge on Ash Wednesday.
It doesn't bother anyone. It's freedom of expression and they're practicing their religion openly without proselytizing.
There are churches in downtowns where the same business people go to worship throughout the week and pray on their breaks and lunches. No big deal. It's been that way since the founding of this country.
For someone who claims to be educated and a school teacher, that is just ignorance not to know what Ash Wednesday is or the symbolism behind the smudge. It's also intolerant and bigoted to expect the child wipe it off in front of his peers as well as disrespectful and humiliating.
It's a violation of his First Amendment rights and civil rights.
"Public primary and secondary schools, as well as public colleges and universities, should be open to all members of the public, regardless of their faith. Students should not face discrimination or harassment because of their faith background, their beliefs, their distinctive religious dress, or their religious expression.
The Civil Rights Division's Educational Opportunities Section enforces Title IV of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on religion in public primary and secondary schools, as well as public colleges and universities. Subsection (a)(1) authorizes the Attorney General to bring suit in response to a written complaint by a parent that a child is being "deprived by a school board of the equal protection of the laws." Subsection (a)(2) permits the Attorney General to bring suit upon receiving a written complaint that a student has been "denied admission to or not permitted to continue in attendance at a public college by reason of race, color, religion, sex or national origin." The Attorney General has delegated this authority to the Civil Rights Division.
Additionally, Title IX of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 permits the Attorney General to intervene in any action in federal court, involving any subject matter, "seeking relief from the denial of equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution on account of race, color, religion, sex or national origin," if such intervention is timely made and the Attorney General certifies that the case is of "general public importance." Enforcement of this provision also has been delegated to the Civil Rights Division, and the Division has participated in a number of education-related religious discrimination cases under Title IX.
Some of the types of cases handled by the Civil Rights Division:
Harassment: Title IV may be violated when teachers harass students because of their faith, or, in some cases, when schools are deliberately indifferent to pervasive student-on-student-harassment. For example, the Civil Rights Division reached a settlement in March 2005 with the Cape Henlopen, Delaware School District in a harassment case involving a fourth-grade Muslim student. The student filed a complaint with the Civil Rights Division that she had been harassed by her teacher about her faith in front of her class, including being ridiculed because her mother wore a headscarf. As a result, the student was repeatedly harassed by other students and missed several weeks of school due to emotional distress. The student alleged that the school failed to take adequate remedial action. The settlement required programs for teaching religious tolerance for both teachers and students, and special training and monitoring for the teacher at issue."
https://www.justice.gov/crt/combating-religious-discrimination-and-protecting-religious-freedom-20