By: Jordan Hansen [Co-Editor of the Vox]

Church. School. Two words that aren’t often in the same sentence, unless there happens to be a controversy going on in the news. It’s a very fine line, and many court cases have been fought over the very subject.

But one fact remains. Many students are ignorant when it comes to religions. One only has to go down the hall and hear people say “Jew” as if it is a terrible thing to be one, or some snide, derogatory term about the people of the Middle East. It’s ridiculous, and though it is students just being mean and terrible, but it’s something built from decades of ignorance.  It’s a failure of the school, state, country, and even parents.

Church and School keep an arm’s distance from each other, and it has been that way for a long time. But if you think about it, all it’s doing is closing down students minds to other peoples religions. Unless someone does private, outside of school research, his or her understanding of these religions is next to nothing. Obviously, no one should stereotype other people for what their beliefs are, but people do anyway. It’s a sad fact, which actually speaks quite a bit about our culture.

But what could the school possibly do? It could become stricter on what people say, but would that really work? Most likely not, as people swear and say mean, terrible things as almost an automatic response. It could also allow teachers to actively talk about there religions and what they believe, but that is fairly borderline when it comes to a school setting, and many court cases have called for even more separation of the two. So in essence, there is nothing the school can do, right?

Wrong. What about a completely optional world religions class? Our school never seems to have enough money for anything, but isn’t learning about other people’s beliefs and possibly changing someone’s mind, a little more important than a class about making food? Not to dig at foods class, or it’s teachers, but sometimes I think students, and the administration, are a little bit short-sided on what’s really important.

Sadly enough, this will probably never happen, but even so, the message remains the same. It’s important to open your eyes and realize that someday, you might say the wrong thing to someone. A few specific people dictating what we learn, and what we don’t learn, are only proceeding to take our future down a path that none of us want to go.