Barry Duke, the Angry Atheist

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1. 

   As someone who produced dozens of nativity plays as a teacher and a Sunday School leader, that title ‘A Gay…

2. 

   The defence of a Christian view never seems to be settled by debate: exchange of facts, reference to historical events.…

3. 

   But …… Rwanda is a safe place: Parliament says so.https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2024/8/contentsSafety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act 2024 S 2 Safety…

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   Religion can survive only on the most unquestionable assumptions. The statements made on Sundays on the BBC as if they…

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   Yes, if I’ve got anything remotely like a phobia, as an ex-fundy, its bibles, churches, tracts etc. I like to…

OKLAHOMA’S Republican Attorney General Gentner Drummond, above, stands accused of failing to respect Catholics’ wishes to establish the nation’s first religious public charter school after he sued to stop the plan.

The accusation, according to this Religion News report, came from state Governor Kevin Stitt, a religious nutjob who once prayed that “every square inch of Oklahoma” should be claimed for Jesus.

Drummonds’s legal action was prompted by a plan to establish the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual Charter School sponsored by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City.

Drummond had warned that the establishment and funding of the school would violate both the state and U.S. constitutions.

Drummond then filed the lawsuit with the Oklahoma Supreme Court against the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board after three of the board’s members signed a contract for the school.

His lawsuit stated:

Make no mistake, if the Catholic Church were permitted to have a public virtual charter school, a reckoning will follow in which this state will be faced with the unprecedented quandary of processing requests to directly fund all petitioning sectarian groups.

The school board voted 3-2 in June to approve the Catholic Archdiocese’s application to establish the online public charter school, which would be open to students across the state in kindergarten through grade 12.

In its application, the Archdiocese said its vision is that the school:

Participates in the evangelizing mission of the Church and is the privileged environment in which Christian education is carried out.

Religion News pointed out that the push for a publicly-funded religious school is the latest in a series of actions taken by conservative-led states that include efforts to teach the Bible in public schools, and to ban books and lessons about race, sexual orientation and gender identity.

Oklahoma’s Constitution specifically prohibits the use of public money or property from being used, directly or indirectly, for the use or benefit of any church or system of religion. Almost 60 percent of Oklahoma voters rejected a proposal in 2016 to remove that language from the Constitution.

A group of Oklahoma parents, faith leaders and a public education nonprofit had already filed a lawsuit in district court in July seeking to stop St. Isidore from operating as a charter school in Oklahoma. That case is pending.

Image via YouTube

Stitt, above, who earlier this year signed a bill that would give parents public funds to send their children to private schools, including religious schools, criticized Drummond’s lawsuit as a “political stunt.”

AG Drummond seems to lack any firm grasp on the constitutional principle of religious freedom and masks his disdain for the Catholics’ pursuit by obsessing over non-existent schools that don’t neatly align with his religious preference.

Still and his wife Sarag are longtime members of an Assemblies of God church in Tulsa.

Drummond defeated Stitt’s hand-picked Attorney General in last year’s GOP primary and the two Republicans have clashed over Stitt’s hostile position toward many Native American tribes in the state.

The AG’s lawsuit also suggests that the board’s vote could put at risk more than $1 billion in federal education dollars that Oklahoma receives that require the state to comply with federal laws that prohibit a publicly funded religious school.

Drummond said in a statement:

Not only is this an irreparable violation of our individual religious liberty, but it is an unthinkable waste of our tax dollars.

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, a nonprofit organization that supports the public charter school movement, released a statement Friday in support of Drummond’s challenge.

A public charter school is a school that’s publicly funded, free to attend, and run by independent contracts. Often, people will confuse public charter schools with private schools, but they are quite different in terms of funding, accessibility, and structure.

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