Thursday, May 26, 2005

Indiana judge tells parents they cannot teach their child about their religion

In a startling move, even for these times and even for Indiana, a judge in Indianapolis has ruled that a man and his former wife cannot expose their child to the couple's Wiccan faith. Thomas E. Jones and Tammy U. Bristol must not expose their child to "non-mainstream religious beliefs and rituals," according to their divorce decree. The judge, Cale J. Bradford, an idiot of the type that boggles the mind, did not define "mainstream religion."

The child, a nine-year-old boy, attends a Catholic school, and the judge stated that the divergent belief systems in his life would confuse him.

Does this mean that the courts in Indiana will now demand that mixed faith marriages cannot exist if there are children involved? Is Islam a mainstream religion? Is Judaism? If the child were attending a Hebrew school, can you imagine the judge telling one of the parents s/he couldn't teach him about Jesus?

Jones has brought the case to the Indiana Court of Appeals with the help of the Indiana Civil Liberties Union.

7 Comments:

Gosh, they were right...we must stop unrestrained judicial activism! Call Dobson, quick!

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:18 AM  

You are on quite a roll these days, D.

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:30 AM  

Well, with that remark coming from the hottest wheels in the 'sphere, I'm flattered.

By Blogger Diane, at 11:37 AM  

Indiana; that's my assbackward state for you.

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:02 PM  

Yeah, as a Neo-Pagan living in Indy, you can imagine how thrilled I was to read this story in today's paper. I already feel besieged on all sides by evangelical Christians who are the clear majority in the state.

(I have a coworker who sings gospel songs to herself at her desk. Audibly. She cannot have a conversation about *anything* without introducing Jesus into it. This is the state government, too, so ostensibly I have rights to a non-hostile work environment, but ...)

Mychelline

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:30 PM  

You should sit at your desk and sing "Sympathy for the Devil."

By Blogger Diane, at 2:40 PM  

I don't know if you saw Volokh on this, but he wrote:

"If the order is as reported, then it's a blatant violation of the Free Speech Clause (because it's a speech restriction), the Free Exercise Clause (because it singles out religion for special restriction), the Establishment Clause (because it prefers some religions over others, and requires the court to decide what's a "mainstream" religion), and likely the Equal Protection Clause (because the order discriminates based on religion) and the Due Process Clause (because of the order's vagueness) as well."

By Blogger Fred Vincy, at 2:46 AM  

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