Palimpsest – a document written over leaving traces of the original
A palimpsest is an old writing scraped from the original manuscript material to make room for a later over-writing, leaving only traces of the original.
We have witnessed an erosion of the plain meaning of the words found in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibiting any government, federal, state or local, from “establishing” a religion. We have a federal appellate decision as recent as this year plainly re-stating that religious worship in schools is an activity that violates the First Amendment. Yet some government entities have embraced practices establishing religion, in effect, over-writing the plain meaning of the First Amendment.
In the past week, I invited our local government agencies to stop using public buildings for religious worship as a plain and blatant constitutional violation.
In response, some agreed that they couldn’t understand how or why the County permitted church services in our public schools. One wrote, “I have been bothered by the Grace Church sign on Harmony Middle School for some time. Wrote a letter to LCPS Administration but didn’t even receive a reply.” Continue reading
Trigger warning: Rape, domestic violence and child abuse denialism, victim-blaming.