Took part in Apache ceremonies. schools expelled them for satanic activities

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2024/jun/24/apache-students-school-reservation

by a_w • 2 years ago

30 20 2 years ago

qarl5• 2 years ago

We're going backwards.

shiroiushi5• 2 years ago

Who's "we"? This was about a private Lutheran school. It's ridiculous of course, but if you sign up for a private school, you have to put up with whatever ridiculous BS they want to push on you, no matter how medieval. My question is: why are these people sending their kids to this shitty school? This is the whole reason public education exists.

qarl5• 2 years ago

I'm not sure what your point is. "We" are collective humanity. These things seem to be happening more and more. Stories that sound like they're from 100 years ago occur today with growing frequency. It appears "we" are going backwards.

39896880• 2 years ago

Public schools aren’t very good on reservations.

karakfa2• 2 years ago

they claim they got it right when it comes to region but

"...there are over 80 churches on the reservation, representing 27 different Christian denominations."

GauntletWizard• 2 years ago

How stupid, ignorant, and bigoted. Still, I mostly fault the parents for not paying closer attention before deciding to send their kids to these private schools. It's fairly vile that anyone would build an ostensibly educational organization on reservation land with a belief that tribal religion is "satanic" in nature, but the parents chose to send them to this school - There's a large dose of "Caveat Emptor" and a smaller dose of "Sue them for fraud" depending on how much they were paying attention before sending their kids there.

bee_rider• 2 years ago

The morning of Good Friday, Father John Cormack, presiding priest of St Francis of Assisi Catholic church in Fort Apache, agreed to an interview in his office. His ministry – a rarity on the reservation – is an example of the weaving of Apache tradition into Christianity. The chapel is decorated in Apache symbols and sacred tools. When he collects written prayers, Father John uses Apache traditional burden baskets, canes and other ceremonial objects. Above the door are Eagle feathers, a sacred symbol of strength.

What a cool guy.

Historically the Catholic Church has gotten up to all sorts of nonsense, but they seem to be doing a good job of keeping up with the times, to the extent that a church can be expected to.

The East Fork Lutheran school, on the other hand, isn’t looking so good.

defrost2• 2 years ago

From 19 hours earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40796301 (7 comments)

a_w• 2 years ago

Morality aside, I was hopping to see a discussion on the legal side of this issue.

1. Doesn't Title VI apply here?

2. Could a company legally fire an employee for practicing their religion/tradition on the weekends, outside of the office grounds?

Anon_4512• 2 years ago

"No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance."

Key words: receiving federal financial assistance. It's a private religious school, meaning it is barred from receiving government funding.

If you meant Title VII, that is generally prohibited, but not in the case of religious organizations. Case law has found that they are free to discriminate in their hiring practices (https://constitution.findlaw.com/amendment1/annotation08.htm...). It also doesn't stop a non-religious company from doing so but not disclosing their reason to the terminated employee, which they have no obligation to do in right-to-work jurisdictions.

Furthermore, reservations sit in a gray legal zone where they are considered semi-autonomous sovereign nations. In practice this exempts them from state law, but they are generally subject to federal law.

Observe this comment from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission website (https://www.eeoc.gov/frequently-asked-questions-about-indian...):

"The EEOC does not have jurisdiction over charges of employment discrimination against federally recognized Tribes if the alleged discrimination is based on race, national origin, sex, color, or religion (under Title VII), disability (under the ADA), or genetic information (under GINA)."

Anon_4512• 2 years ago

Story has two sides to it. On one, you have a faith-based private school built on a native reservation with the explicit purpose of being as bigoted as possible toward the people living there, which is horrible, but on par for the behavior of such organizations. On the other, you have natives who continue to send their children to that school despite generations of this pattern because of better educational outcomes than the U.S. federal public school.

There are a few possible calls to action here. You're not going to convince the ministry to change their outlook -- you might as well ask an alligator to stop eating meat. As a religious organization they are exempt from many laws that would get government or corporate groups in trouble, particularly if the families signed a paper to enroll their kids. It comes down to biting the bullet and playing along with the school's BS, or biting the other bullet and seeking alternative educational providers. It would be great if as a community they could find their own path to creating better public schools (having the freedom to build casinos provides a readily-available revenue stream, if you can solve the leadership corruption issue), but failing that, I guess the U.S. federal government could throw more money at the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

I can emphasize with the kids because I grew up atheist in an overwhelmingly Mormon backwoods town, where I was the "devil worshiper" and treated like garbage for it. On the other hand, the families have alternatives available to them. If the alternatives suck, they should look into how to make them better.

Took part in Apache ceremonies. schools expelled them for satanic activities

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