Fla. Gov. Rick Scott weighs in on 'Jesus' stomping incident at Florida Atlantic University

From: McClatchy

Florida Atlantic University has apologized for a controversial classroom lesson that led critics to accuse the school of religious intolerance. But that didn’t stop Gov. Rick Scott for stepping into the fray on Tuesday.

Scott penned a letter to State University System Chancellor Frank Brogan demanding an investigation. “I am requesting a report of the incident, how it was handled and a statement of the university’s policies to ensure this type of ‘lesson’ will not occur again,” Scott wrote.

Earlier this month, FAU instructor Deandre Poole told students in an intercultural communications class to write the word “Jesus” on a piece of paper, throw it on the floor and stomp on it. Ryan Rotela, a junior at FAU’s Davie campus, later complained he was thrown out of class when he refused to participate.


“Anytime you stomp on something it shows that you believe that something has no value. So if you were to stomp on the word Jesus, it says that the word has no value,” Rotela told CBS12, a West Palm Beach television station.

Rotela, who describes himself as a devout Mormon, went to Poole’s supervisor two days later to discuss the incident.

FAU officials defended the professor last week, but Rotela told The Palm Beach Post that he and an attorney from the Texas-based Liberty Institute met with FAU Dean of Students Cory King at the school’s Boca Raton campus on Monday and received an apology and a pledge that the disciplinary charges against him would be dropped.

“He apologized in person for what happened and how everything went out of control,” Rotela, 21, who lives in Coral Springs, told the newspaper.

He takes classes part-time at FAU, while working for a landscaping service.

FAU officials did not respond to The Miami Herald about Scott’s letter, but had issued a statement about the incident to The Palm Beach Post.

“This exercise will not be used again,” the statement said. “The University holds dear its core values.

We sincerely apologize for any offense this caused. Florida Atlantic University respects all religions and welcomes people of all faiths, backgrounds and beliefs.”

Said Kim Wilmath, a spokeswoman for the State University System of Florida: “The State University System prides itself not only on its commitment to academic freedom, but at the same time, its awesome responsibility to the people it serves.

“We are gratified to know that FAU has apologized for any offense the exercise has caused and has pledged never to use this exercise again. Clearly, there were things the university could have done differently by its own acknowledgement.”


The incident became fodder on blogs and among conservatives who questioned whether such liberties would have been taken with other religions.

In his letter, Scott makes clear he wants more than merely an apology.

“Whether the student was reprimanded or whether an apology was given is in many ways inconsequential to the larger issue of a professor’s poor judgment,” Scott wrote.

“The professor’s lesson was offensive, and even intolerant, to Christians and those of all faiths who deserve to be respected as Americans entitled to religious freedom.”

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/03/27/187044/fla-gov-scott-weighs-in-on-jesus.html#storylink=cpy

College Student Says He’s Been Suspended After He Refused Prof’s Demand to Stomp on Jesus Sign

And On the Third Day..........

Crucifixion

The Gethsemane of the Monks

From: Real Clear Religion

The eminent evolutionary biologist Martin Nowak has just published SuperCooperators, a book offering his theory of why natural selection may paradoxically favor altruism. The Harvard scientist's insight is that evolutionary success is not simply a matter of "survival of the fittest," but also in some cases requires co-operation -- which is to say, a degree of self-sacrifice. Put another way, Nowak argues that the values taught by Jesus Christ are encoded within human biology.

It's a provocative idea, but I don't think it can adequately account for how Christ ended his life. To suffer and die for one's family and friends is understandable. But for strangers? That's harder to conceive. And beyond that, to forgive one's killers, even in one's dying breaths? To do that requires something far beyond mere biological instinct, or rationality. It requires a superabundance of altruism. It requires a love so pure it cannot be explained.

The mystery of this kind of love is what Christians confronted Easter weekend. It began in the garden of Gethsemane, when Jesus sweated blood in agonized anticipation of his arrest. The Gospels tell us that Jesus, in his terror, asked God to spare him the cup of suffering, but "not as I will, but as you will." In this account, Jesus wishes to be spared from his passion, but not if it means going against the will of God.

The story then moves to his trial, scourging, and crucifixion on Good Friday. "Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do," Jesus said as the life drained from him. The narrative ends with the resurrection of Jesus on the third day, the miracle of all miracles, which, in Christian belief, won eternal life for all who unite themselves to him.

It is a breathtaking story, even if taken as myth, but it's also one whose familiarity in Western culture has drained away much of its transformative power. The tidy, Sunday School answers we grew up with fail to convey the radical significance of the Passion. Sometimes, we have to experience this old story in new ways to make it live in our moral imagination.

Paradoxically, literary archvillains, from Dostoevsky's Grand Inquisitor to Flannery O'Connor's murderous Misfit, have a better grasp of the Jesus they reject than many of us who call him Lord. They realized how the bizarre tale of the God-man who loved so fully he accepted an unjust death and renounced vengeance.

Jesus, said the Misfit, "thrown everything off balance. If He did what He said, then it's nothing for you to do but throw away everything and follow Him, and if He didn't, then its nothing for you to do but enjoy the few minutes you got left the best way you can ... ."

So says O'Connor's escaped convict, who understands better the cost of Christian discipleship than many of us disciples of Christ, who live our religion as ideas to be understood by reason rather than mysteries to be embraced with self-sacrificing love. Religious truth is the kind of truth that can only be fully known by living it out. Despite what we say and think, we live as if the last Christian died on the cross.

Florissant Man Told To Remove “Jesus” Sign From His Yard

From: CBS St. Louis

Fred Bodimer

March 25, 2011 9:22 AM

FLORISSANT, Mo. (KMOX) - A north St. Louis County man says he can’t believe what he found in his mailbox — a letter from his subdivision committee telling him he had to take down his yard sign.

The simple green sign has a single word written in white…”Jesus”.

“What is this? What kind of country are we living in?,” Michael Mayfield asks incredulously.

Mayfield lives in unincorporated Florissant, in a subdivision called Weatherby Place off Shackleford.

He says as a Christian, he proudly placed the familiar green-and-white sign in his yard as a declaration of his faith.

“And they told me I had to remove it,” Mayfield tells KMOX News. “I mean it just shocked me to no end to even read a letter like this. It spelled out ‘Jesus’, and that really captured my attention that they would go as far as to spell out the name ‘Jesus’.”

Mayfield says his sign isn’t going anywhere; in fact, he’s still deciding whether to put up more Jesus signs in his front yard.

No response yet from the subdivision’s operators, D & I Properties.

School: "Pick a Song that Doesn't Say Jesus

From: Creative Minority Report

A school in California attempted to prevent a disabled student from using his choice of song in the talent show because the song inluded the word "Jesus."

I'm honestly asking if that song had used the word "ho" or was downright anti-Christian would the school have protested?

Principal Calls Jesus Song Offensive: MyFoxLA.com