Category Archives for Bible in schools

Public School District Decides Against Controversial Bible Curriculum Reviewed by TFN Education Fund Scholar

Following months of controversy, an Oklahoma school district has announced that it will not implement a new Bible curriculum that was the subject of a scathing report from the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund this past June. Museum of the Bible, a nonprofit created by Steve Green, president of the Oklahoma City-based retailer Hobby Lobby, is publishing […]

Also posted in Steve Green, TFNEF | 6 Comments

Can This Class Be Saved? In All Aspects of Life, the Bible ‘Has Been Good,’ Steve Green Says

In an earlier Can This Class Be Saved? post we discussed a speech by Steve Green from April 2013 in which the president of Hobby Lobby discusses his Museum of the Bible public school Bible curriculum that has been approved for a trial run in Mustang, Oklahoma, and what Green’s comments say about his intentions in […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | 1 Comment

Can This Class Be Saved? Bible Course Teaches That Adam and Eve Were Actual Historical People

How inappropriate for public schools is the new Bible course curriculum from Museum of the Bible, a nonprofit created by Hobby Lobby President Steve Green? As Mark Chancey, a biblical scholar at Southern Methodist University, points out in his review of The Book: The Bible’s History, Narrative and Impact, the curriculum echoes Green’s belief in the Bible’s complete literal […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | 9 Comments

Can This Class Be Saved? Bible Course Says Einstein’s Theory of Relativity Backs Up Genesis Creation Story

Christian Creationists believe the Bible’s Genesis story of creation — that God created life, Earth and the rest of the universe in six days — is literally true. That certainly is not the belief of all or even most Christians (or Jews). Even so, SMU biblical scholar Mark Chancey points out that the new Bible curriculum from Museum of the […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | 3 Comments

Can This Class Be Saved? Bible Course Compares Book of Exodus to Infamously Racist ‘Birth of a Nation’ Film

Hobby Lobby President Steve Green and the nonprofit he created, Museum of the Bible, insist that respected scholars helped create their new Bible curriculum. But Mark Chancey, a biblical scholar at SMU in Dallas, questions how that could be true. Chancey found numerous errors and bizarre passages in his review of the curriculum for the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund. […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | Leave a comment

Can This Class Be Saved? ‘This Nation Is in Danger,’ Steve Green Says

Yesterday the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund released our latest report, Can This Class Be Saved? Authored by Southern Methodist University religious studies professor Mark Chancey, the report looks at a new public school Bible curriculum created with backing from Hobby Lobby President Steve Green. Green, as you’ll recall, has been in the news a lot lately […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | 4 Comments

TFNEF Report: Bible Curriculum Backed by Hobby Lobby President Would Lead to Preaching, Not Teaching, in Public Schools

Hobby Lobby’s president Steve Green has sponsored the development of a new Bible curriculum, The Book: The Bible’s History, Narrative and Impact, that he reportedly hopes thousands of public schools will adopt. The curriculum will be published by Museum of the Bible, a nonprofit organization created by Green to guide the development of a museum […]

Also posted in Hobby Lobby, Steve Green, TFNEF | 7 Comments

The Day My Son Was Taught ‘Bible’ in a Public School

What happens when public schools cross the line by promoting personal religious views in their classrooms? One Texas parent — a religious studies scholar — explains what happened to her family in this cross-post (with permission) from Scribalishess. Susan M. Pigott is a professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at a small, liberal arts university […]

Also posted in church and state, TFNEF | 30 Comments

Texas Bible Courses: ‘Racial Origins Traced from Noah’ (continued)

When we published Reading, Writing & Religion II: Texas Public School Bible Courses in 2011-12, we expected pushback from some of the districts we discussed. But no one has protested more vigorously than the minister who authored the Amarillo Independent School District’s Bible curriculum and currently teaches its course. This teacher has complained loudly and […]

Also posted in TFNEF | 6 Comments

Texas Public School Bible Courses: Christian Nationalism and Phony Quotations

Students in some Texas public school Bible courses learn that the Founding Fathers were largely orthodox Protestant Christians who intended for the United States to be a distinctively Christian nation with laws and a form of government based on the Bible. Countless historians and other scholars have shown how such claims are distortions, but those […]

Also posted in TFNEF | 9 Comments