Sermons and the ‘Last Supper’: How Texas’ Greg Abbott ramrodded the Bible into schools | Opinion
Texas wrote the Golden Rule into kindergarten lessons.
But state officials don’t follow it.
They broke it the other day in the most blatant of ways: with a dodgy power play on the State Board of Education, giving an appointed Republican from Pantego the deciding vote on new lessons as the representative of a heavily Democratic south Dallas and southeast Fort Worth district.
The board voted, 8-7, on Nov. 22 to approve the state’s own Bluebonnet Learning lessons, bringing parables and characters from various religions including Christianity into elementary-school English and reading classes.
Kindergarten students will learn reading by studying lessons including six different faiths’ versions of the Golden Rule. Among them is Matthew 7:12: “Do unto others as you would have done unto you.”
It should have a footnote: “Does not apply in Texas.”
“Aren’t we doing to Jewish people what we would not want done to us?” Fort Worth Republican board member Pat Hardy asked last week.
Hardy was one of three Republicans on the losing side of the vote, along with four Democrats, after Gov. Greg Abbott hand-picked Pantego Republican Leslie Recine to railroad through the deciding vote before another Democrat could be seated.
For this one meeting only, Recine was chosen to fill the Democratic Dallas-Fort Worth District 13 seat left open after the Aug. 1 resignation of Aicha Davis of DeSoto, who left the board to win a Texas House seat. Another Democrat, Tiffany Clark of DeSoto, replaced Davis on the Nov. 5 ballot and will be sworn in Jan. 1.
The barbell-shaped district connects minority neighborhoods in Dallas., Grand Prairie, Arlington and Fort Worth with a narrow “handle” through Republican west Arlington and Pantego.
So for one meeting — because Davis had to resign early to make room for Clark on the ballot — that entire district had no elected board member.
Instead, Abbott got to choose his own personal board member.
Hardy is retiring as the District 11 board member for west Fort Worth and adjacent counties after losing in the Republican primary.
She and Recine have known each other 20 years through Republican women’s clubs and campaigns.
Recine has worked quietly for the party all those years. I can’t think of a south Arlington-area Republican who has worked longer and harder than Recine.
“I think Leslie was just told she needed to vote,” Hardy said.
Recine did not return a message.
State officials had deeply invested both time and money into a curriculum which includes secular lessons along with religious teachings — for example, the Sermon on the Mount, finding poetry in Psalms, the bible story of Queen Esther or an English class discussion of Rembrandt’s “The Last Supper.”
Hardy said her objections primarily did not involve the religious lessons because they’re not mandatory.
Mostly, she doesn’t agree with the age level for much of the material — “You’re supposed to ask kindergartners what made Cleopatra a ‘good leader’?” — and with the method of teaching reading.
“It doesn’t work,” she said. “We’re turning away from what works.”
Hardy said she is proud of her 35-year career as a history teacher and counselor at Castleberry and Weatherford and 22 years on the board.
She said her career was about ”trying to always put children first, not trying to make other people happy.”
That’s exactly what got her beat.
Weatherford pastor Brandon Hall, an anti-LGBT activist, promised to always vote with the Republican majority and not cast independent votes across the aisle.
The two have not spoken, Hardy said.
“He lied about me in mailers,” Hardy said.
So much for that Golden Rule.
This story was originally published November 27, 2024 at 9:24 AM.
