Mercedes Schneider posted a commentary by James Kirylo, who responds to the extremists who say that God was ousted from the public schools.
Really?
He writes:
”To say that a reason why school shootings happen is because we have taken God or prayer out of the schools is too simplistic, if not too ridiculous, an explanation. To communicate that to the parents of the children assassinated at Stoneman Douglas would not only be heartless, but also, it seems to me, such a message would be a theologically and spiritually scandalous description of an omnipotent, loving God.
“Moreover, the notion of the “removal” of God is to grossly diminish the sacrificial witness of those educators who stood in harm’s way in the attempt to save what students they could at the school.
“Heroes in our Midst
“Take for example, the geography teacher, Scott Beigel, 35, who was murdered while scampering to get students away from the gunfire. As one student, Kelsey Friend, shared, “Mr. Beigel was my hero and he still will forever be my hero. I will never forget the actions that he took for me and for fellow students in the classroom.” I am alive today because of him.”
“Then there was assistant football coach Aaron Feis, 37, who bravely threw himself in front of students, suffering a grave wound, dying on the surgery table. Colton Haab, a 17-year-old junior at the school, said “That’s Coach Feis. He wants to make sure everybody is safe before himself.”
“Finally, there was Chris Hixon, 49, the school’s athletic director and wrestling coach, who died while trying to save students. Mourning the loss, Karlos Valentin, a senior on the wrestling squad stated, “Coach Hixon, for me, was a father figure.”
“By any definition, these educators are heroes, even modern day martyrs, who exemplify what it means to lay down their lives for their friends.
“The greatest witness of any educator, and in particular for those who claim to believe in a loving God, is not what they say, but what they do in how they demonstrate love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, and care for all their students. Courageously, some great educators at Stoneman Douglas personified the ultimate act of love.”
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
What … an all-powerful god evicted by bureaucrats? Impossible!
Need we point out that mass killings have been taking place in churches for quite a long time. If their god cannot protect His own churches, why do they think He could protect the schools?
These lies need to be called out and the people making them shamed. Students can pray all they want, as long as it doesn’t disturb classes. They can pray quietly (as they are directed in Matthew 1-6) during algebra tests. They can pray on their knees during the time between classes and during their lunch period. They can sit outdoors and pray up a storm before and after school. What we do not allow is for school officials to dictate the prayers. Everyone wants this!!! The Protestants don’t want to have to do Catholic prayers and vice-versa. The Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs don’t want to have to recite Christian prayers. And even if your community is 100% Southern Baptist, if you establish this precedent and a large number of Muslims move into your town, enough to create a majority, do you want your kids praying to Allah every day?
The people making these claims don’t even know what they want and are still willing to spout lies for Jesus!
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Was it Mike Huckabee who said that some devastating hurricane was God’s wrath on America for tolerating gays?
What a nasty god he has.
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Someone said God created man in his own image and man has been returning the favor ever since.
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I’ve thought about this often over the decades, and I think God created humans not in his physical image since he is not physical, but the image of the God we see in the Old Testament, the characteristics of His nature revealed by His actions.
Because God is a spirit, this means he is “invisible.” We cannot see God so if humans were created in God’s image, then we were created to mirror His behavior.
“How should we understand biblical texts where God is depicted as acting irrationally, violently, or destructively? … How does the often wrathful God portrayed in the Old Testament relate to the God of love proclaimed in the New Testament”
http://fortresspress.com/product/disturbing-divine-behavior-troubling-old-testament-images-god
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What’s James Kirylo high on?
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“It comes as no surprise that God warns us many times in Scripture to be aware of false teaching. Christians need to be able to recognize false teachers in order to know when they are being led down a path that God did not intend!”
Matthew 24:24 (one example)
“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.”
https://www.biblestudytools.com/topical-verses/bible-verses-about-false-teachers/
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Betsy DeVos
Thank you to all of the brave students, parents & educators who came to share your thoughts & ideas with @POTUS, @VP and me. We must make our nation’s schools safer & I look forward to our continued conversations around advancing solutions that will work.
It’s a shame that public school families are only invited to DC when it’s “discuss school shootings and then do nothing” time.
90% of schools in this country are completely ignored at the federal level, unless there’s some massive event.
It’s ridiculous and it’s the result of complete and utter capture by the ed reform movement.
They add NO VALUE to 90% of schools. None. Yet we’re all supposed to pay them and take their advice.
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Why would any public school leader anywhere listen to Betsy DeVos or the US Department on public schools?
They have zero interest in US public schools. In fact, they hope to eradicate them.
Don’t listen to people who don’t value your public schools on how to RUN your public schools. That’s nuts.
Charter leaders would never do it. If DeVos and the rest of the DC crew traveled the country bashing charter schools, like they do public schools, there isn’t a charter leader in this country who would put up with and they CERTAINLY wouldn’t take advice from them!
Why are public schools stuck with a federal government that OPPOSES public schools?
That’s not fair to public school families and it is outrageous to ask us to pay them for it!
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This brought tears to my eyes. Thank you for sharing what Mr. Kirylo wrote.
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The mere fact that people can say idiotic religious things and have a large media coverage shows how backward the country has become. Feels like middle ages. When the burning of heretics starts?
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To any Christian, the charge that God has been taken out of school is such a transparent attempt to divide Christendom that it need not be considered for even a moment. The distant right has used issues like prayer in the schools to divide congregations and create a church that cares more for its numbers than its devotion to the philosophy.
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I agree. People project their own interpretations of God, and some of these people are nasty. I can recall a pastor in the ’80s suggesting that God was punishing “sinners” with the HIV virus. Ridiculous and nasty!
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Perhaps if Scott Beigel, Aaron Feis, and Chris Hixon had the choice to have a firearm at school and been able to shoot back they would be alive and so would many more of their students….just speculating.
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One problem with your speculating. Rounds once fired don’t discriminate. They hit whatever they hit even if it is another teacher or child. Even the best military snipers don’t hit the target all the time.
In the military, there are rules of combat not to fire into a crowd and to only fire when you see who is firing at you but to avoid hitting innocent civilians as much as possible.
That doesn’t work well because in combat when you are being shot at you shoot back and often hit innocent civilians and miss the shooters.
In combat, those innocent civilians are not called innocent civilians. They are called collateral damage.
For instance, with students running in a panic in every direction, those teachers that died shielding students, instead, fire an entire clip at the shooter, if they spot him as the shooter, and many of those rounds end up hitting other children.
Do we call the innocent children hit by those stray rounds collateral damage too, and once the bullets are linked to the weapon the teachers fired do we still call them heroes or do we crucify them as careless killers?
I know exactly what I’m talking about. I was a U.S. Marine and I still am a combat vet that fought in Vietnam. I know that once the round leaves the barrel, you have no control over what it hits or misses. Even a puff of wind or a jerk of the trigger finger can change where that round ends up.
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Which “God” are we talking about? Hindu God Vishnu? Buddha? Muslim God Mohammed? Or the ever-popular Jesus? This discussion usually centers around a group of people that think Christianity is the only religion students should follow, and why we have separation of Church and State in the first place.
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I am all for separation of church and state. You keep your god and I’ll keep mine. Don’t ask me to subsidize your religious school, and I won’t ask you to subsidize mine.
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I agree. I recall being very angry with GW Bush when he suspended stem cell research, which continues to help lots of people, on religious grounds.
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