Christian group claims teaching science promotes ‘atheistic’ worldview for Kansas students

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A religious group has filed suit against the Kansas Board of Education seeking to stop educators from adopting global warming and evolution into the state curriculum. The Christian organization said such lessons would violate parents’ religious freedom.

The non-profit group, known as Citizens for Objective Public Education (COPE), has attacked Kansas along with 25 other states and the National Research Council for implementing new standards which mandate that mainstream science be taught in classrooms. COPE is based in the small town of Peck, Kansas, to the south of Wichita.

Fifteen parents and their 18 children joined the suit, with one telling the Associated Press they are Christians who want their children to believe “life is a creation made for a purpose.” The Kansas state Department of Education and the state board are named in the suit.

“The state’s job is simply to say to students, ‘How life arises continues to be a scientific mystery and there are competing ideas about it,’” said John Calvert, a local attorney involved in the case.

The evolution vs. creationism controversy was rendered irrelevant by scientists and the court system decades ago but the debate rages on in the US between religious groups, primarily Christians, and school administrators trying to keep education modern.

Joshua Rosenau, programs and policy director for the California-based National Center for Science Education, told AP that Calvert, the attorney arguing against the school, has been making such arguments for years, although “no one in the legal community has put much stock in it.”

“They’re trying to say anything that’s not promoting their religion is promoting some other religion,” he said, going on to deem the discussion “silly.”
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