@wandeljw,
I wonder if some who think world religions should be taught in science classes are dumb enough to think they aren't in textbooks and lessons for history classes. If one takes Art History I, they're covered -- from Egyptian and other early art through the entire history of art. Religion as an art theme, of course, all but died out with the Impressionist (whose focus was on nature and the human figure) and Modern Art virtually ignores it. If the history is of the Mayans, there is a study of their religion included, if it's of the Chinese, their religion is included. The religions are not the focus of history classes, but if one is taking a class in the history of Rome, their religion of polytheism is covered and that, again, the fact that Constantine didn't convert to Christianity, but allowed it to exist alongside the traditional Roman religion. The difference is dramatic as in history classes all religions are covered and if the teacher is proselytizing for any one religion (not just revealing their own) or advocating not believing in any religion, or to be agnostics or atheistic, they aren't doing their job and should suffer the consequences. That's the crux of not teaching any one religion's version of how the Earth was formed and how all animal life on Earth was formed in a science class. Let those who want to study the Christian religion attend theological schools. A science classroom is no place to inject any one religion and there is an obvious attempt to teach the Christian religion while excluding all others.
There's an excellent essay on what happened to religion in art from the NYT:
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/03/11/arts/art-view-when-nature-became-god-art-changed.html?sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all
For those who don't subscribe to the online NYT and don't want to subscribe (at no cost):
ART VIEW; When Nature Became God, Art Changed
By Michael Brenson
In the heart of the sleepy village in ''The Starry Night'' is a Dutch church that van Gogh transposed to the south of France. Its interior is black, its steeple as protective and forbidding as a lance. Although the steeple is a lightning rod for the wave of light flowing across the pre-dawn sky, the church is untouched by the sea of energy and light bolting and spiraling through the cosmic night.
In the left foreground of this 1889 painting are cypresses nestled against each other in euphoric stillness. The large one seems taller than the church. While the church steeple barely rises above the hills, the steeple of this bulbous cypress seems to be climbing right through the sky.
The cypresses are part of the sky. The stars are on fire and the trees are flames. Two stars almost seem to offer themselves to the large tree as wheels or eyes; a third star spins on a smaller tree like a ball on a juggler's finger. In ''The Starry Night,'' it is nature, not the church, that has been touched by God.
Van Gogh's love of nature, his hatred of institutionalized religion and his attempt to substitute the nature he found in the French Midi for the church he grew up with in Holland are discussed in ''Vincent van Gogh: Christianity Versus Nature,'' a book by the art historian Tsukasa Kodera recently published by John Benjamins, a Dutch house. This scholarly essay is helpful for an understanding of van Gogh and of religion of nature that emerged toward the end of the 19th century. Its publication coincides with ''Monet in the 90's: The Series Paintings'' - at the Musuem of Fine Arts in Boston through April 29 - which indexes the bible of nature written by Monet during the last half of his life. And it calls attention to the large issue of the role of nature in modern art, and the degree to which the fate of the natural world has become an esthetic issue.
Van Gogh and Monet turned to nature for protection, guidance and care, and they found in it the freedom to explore within themselves and make paintings that helped shape and define some of the essential conflicts and yearnigns of their time. So much of the sweep of American art and literature depends upon an assumption that the abundance of the American land is inexhaustible. What does it mean for contemporary art that nature itself now needs to be cared for, guided and protected? Van Gogh was far from the only painter for whom nature replaced religion in the 1880's. His skepticism about industrial civilization and his faith in places that were not urban and peole who were not urbane were shared by Guaguin and Cezanne. Indeed, the Post-Impressionism of van Gogh, Gauguin and Cezanne may be the point at which the artistic hope for a balance between industry and nature, progress and conservation, was lost.
--Continued on the link
