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Substitute Teacher

Good morning kids. It’s time for School. Please open your textbooks to CBN. It is the chapter illustrating why Christians shouldn’t be allowed to be teachers:

Utah Teacher Fired After Telling Class ‘Homosexuality is Wrong’

Before diving into the story, let me just point out that the headline is prejudicial and misleading. CBN is trying to create some sympathy for a teacher and imply that she was wrongly fired for simply holding a basic Christian belief. If that is the impression you got from the headline, they succeeded. And they know that most people never make it past the headline. So the headline is the story. And the story is the truth. But as we are about to discover, the headline doesn’t reveal the half of it:

A substitute teacher at a Utah elementary school was fired after she allegedly told the fifth-grade students in her classroom that “homosexuality was a sin” during a pre-Thanksgiving classroom lesson centered around students expressing why they were thankful.

CBN continues the fiction by saying the incident was alleged. That lie is put to the torch in the next paragraph that acknowledges school confirmed the incident. Also note that this was a fifth grade class. These were pre-adolescents. Why would someone be talking about sin to these kids at all? These people believe that it is appropriate to share their religious convictions to anyone, anywhere, under any circumstances where they can gat a captive audience. The story continues:

The Salt Lake Tribune reports the students at Deerfield Elementary School in Cedar Hills, Utah, she launched into an angry anti-homosexual rant when an 11-year old student expressed that he was thankful he was going to be adopted by his two fathers. The school confirmed the incident in a statement to ABC News on Sunday.

Now that we are getting down to the part where people stop reading, the story adds the detail that the teacher launched into an angry anti-homosexual rant. Also bear in mind that the target of this rant was an 11 year old boy. And what do we know about the emotional state of this boy? Just that he was in the process of being adopted, which means he needed to be adopted in the first place. That’s the person this teacher though needed a taste of god’s holy wrath. Are you kidding me? It gets worse:

According to the students, the woman said: “Why on earth would you be happy about that?” And for the next 10 minutes, she lectured the 30 kids about her own views, how “homosexuality is wrong” and “two men living together is a sin.” She looked at the boy, too, and told him: “That’s nothing to be thankful for.”

The substitute continued to talk about homosexuality until three students left the classroom in order to tell the school principal.

Notice how the story has escalated from the impression we got from the headline. It went from a teacher casually mentioning her opinion that homosexuality was wrong to the tirade being so bad and taking so long that three students had the opportunity to get up and go report the teacher to someone slightly less crazy than her.

A boy in a fragile emotional state is about to be adopted and told by the teacher that he had nothing for which to be thankful. Sure, the kid was about to be adopted, a rarity for 11 year old boys. But the teacher knew a higher truth. I can imagine her 10 minute sermon included her saying something like the following:

“Don’t you know what your two daddies are doing behind that locked door at night? Don’t you know that one of your daddies is getting on top of the other daddy’s bottom and pounding it like a cheap beefsteak in need of tenderization? Now, how happy are you that you are about to be adopted you degenerate little turd?”

Whatever she said, I’m certain the love of Jesus shined through. Here’s the thing: She doesn’t even represent the views of the majority of Christians. Poling data suggests that a little over half of all Christians believe same-sex marriage should be legal. They do not believe it is a sin to be homosexual. This is just the view of a certain type of Trump-supporting fundie Christian.

At least there was a bit of a silver lining. The teacher was fired. However, I believe these sorts of incidents are the natural result of hiring people who think like this in the first place. Beliefs have consequences. You wouldn’t hire a person who promoted pedophilia as a sex education teacher. And yet we put young earth proponents in science classrooms. Beliefs have consequences.

So naturally, putting nut job, bigoted, homophobic religious fundies in classrooms where real kids have to deal with these issues in real-world scenarios is just asking for trouble. I wonder what the liability would be if this practically unadaptable child was dropped by these would-be parents because they just wouldn’t be able to handle the persecution. That is the goal of this type of Christian after all. They would rather orphaned boys remain orphaned rather than to have a good home with two daddies.

Bat Shit Crazy!

Secrecy of confession must never be violated, Vatican says

Catholic Standard

https://cathstan.org/news/us-world/secrecy-of-confession-must-never-be-violated-vatican-says

In the light of “a worrying negative prejudice” against the Catholic Church, Pope Francis ordered the publication of a document affirming the absolute secrecy of everything said in confession and calling on priests to defend it at all costs, even at the cost of their lives.

I almost can’t go on from here. And we are only at the first paragraph. This document was released in the light of “a worrying negative prejudice.” Are you kidding me? At this point, it is impossible to have an unjustified negative prejudice of the Catholic Church and their handling of their various scandals. And in case you are wondering, it is not just pedophile priests.

We might cover some of it at a later time. It is just hard to get past the idea that the Vatican is worried about negative prejudice. It’s not prejudice! It is real concern about the things you have been caught doing, and that you continue to do in the name of your religion!

I’m trying to get past this: They are actually trying to make us the bad guys because we are exhibiting prejudice against them. We are the ones overreacting to them raping everything in sight and covering it up. How dare we overreact to that. How dare we hold any negative prejudice as a result of that.

Not only do they feel their policy on confessional secrecy is justified, they feel the need to defend it with their lives. How noble of them. Now many of their victims have paid with their lives. But I am unaware of any priests who have paid with their lives. Yet they want us to some how picture the priests as the martyrs for Jesus, defending the sacred rite. We have to move on:

The need for the absolute secrecy of confession “comes directly from revealed divine law and has its roots in the very nature of the sacrament to the point that no exception whatsoever can be admitted in the ecclesial sphere and even less in the civil one,” a new Vatican document said.

This paragraph sets up the most important thing to watch for. This is about the law of god as opposed to the laws of man. The divine law is the only thing the Christian cares about. I know this is particularly a Catholic issue. But all Christians think this way. Their bible tells them directly they ought to obey god rather than man. The divine law supersedes secular law. Civil laws are the least important laws to these people.

Some recent challenges to the secret of confession have come from states trying to react to the Catholic Church’s clerical sexual abuse crisis, the note acknowledged. The document did not mention any specific proposed legislation, such as that working its way through the California legislature or proposed in Australia in response to a government inquiry into the sex abuse crisis.

People wonder why I read this stuff and rant. It is because beliefs matter. No one is arbitrarily wanting to interfere with Catholic practice. This is a direct response to the Catholic Church knowing exactly which priests are diddling your kid at this very moment and refusing to tell because of their divine law. That’s why it matters.

The latest news about the Buffalo NY bishop who took early retirement at 73 had a secret list of all the priests he knew about who were accused of rape. They were still active in the church. This bishop was caught describing some of the priests as “sick puppies.” You know what he did about them? He took their secret confessions and moved on because while child safety is optional, priest confessions should be guarded with one’s life. It gets battier, shittier, crazier:

“The priest, in fact, comes to know of the sins of the penitent non ut homo sed ut Deus – not as a man, but as God – to the point that he simply ‘does not know’ what was said in the confessional because he did not listen as a man, but precisely in the name of God,” the Vatican document said.

I can’t take much more of this. I’m bleeding out of my ears. I swear I didn’t have a tumor before I started this. You see, the priest in the confessional is not really a man listening to the confession of a man. And he is not merely a human representative of god. He is transformed into an agent of god who hears with different, nonhuman ears. He listens not as man but as god.

Tell me, how exactly does god listen? How do they presume to know that? Their argument is along the lines that god gave Peter, and therefore all priests the ability and responsibility to forgive sins on this earth. In order for them to forgive sins, they must hear confession of those sins. And in order for people to feel comfortable making those confessions, there has to be absolute secrecy.

That seems to be rather convenient for those who want to unburden themselves of their terrible crimes that might otherwise weigh heavily on their conscience. Just think about what this offers. Criminals have a place they can go and make detailed confessions to a responsible human being and not only have the secret kept, but receive absolution of all wrongdoing. It is often said by Christians that atheists are just denying god so they can go on sinning. That couldn’t be further from the truth. If I wanted to sin with impunity and a clean conscience, I would become a Catholic. They would have my back.

Pedophiles, they have your back. Rapists and other abusers, they have your back. Burglars, drug traffickers, embezzlers, tax evaders, and whatever floats your freak, the Catholic Church has got your back. And to hell with civil law. That is not a man in that booth. It is god incarnate. He has forgiven you and no one else need be involved. The human priest doesn’t even hear what you are saying. And to the extent that he does, he forgets it because it wasn’t for his ears but god’s. You can’t subpoena god.

This is how they think. And this is how they act. And this is how they cover up how they act. This stuff is dangerously bat shit crazy! And it is time for people of good conscience to stop ignoring it and start calling it out for what it is.

I’m out!

David Johnson