>If you take out songs that have any religious connotations, and that have "adopted" religious connotations (like "Jingle Bells" -- it was originally a Thanksgiving song, but is now considered a Christmas song), what are we left with? An awful lot of songs sung in elementary school (which is about the only place that the arts are mandatory, at least once a week anyway) are based on the melody from hymns, including some patriotic songs. Oh yeah...forget studying art history, as almost all art prior to the 1800s (except prehistoric art) was sponsored by churches.

There's a difference between studying something as part of an exploration of culture and having that thing be "the way we do things here." I have no problem with teaching kids about the practices of different religious and ethnic groups, as long as it's clearly labeled as such, and as long as lots of groups are covered, not just mainstream Christianity.

In my public high school, in addition to the usual winter concert, we had an assembly each year for which all the foreign language classes had to learn a Christmas carol in their language. (And astonishly, I can still remember that the Latin students sang "Adeste Fideles", French sang "Un flambeau, Jeannette Isabella" and Spanish - which I took - sang "Madre, a la puerta, hay un nino".) The basic idea of teaching language through song was great, but why did it have to be Christmas songs? Why couldn't we simply have learned songs in those languages and done this at another time of year? I remember feeling really uncomfortable with this. I had to sing the assigned song because it was part of the course, but I knew I really shouldn't.

As for studying art history, that falls into the category of learning about, not worshipping. (That's not the verb I want, but I can't think of it right now.)

As you know, my kids are fairly serious about music. I've had to come to terms with the fact that as choristers, much of the music they perform has religious roots (in fact, much is church music). But, they weren't singing this stuff until high school; if they're going to study music at the college level (which several students from our high school do every year), they need this repertoire; and, perhaps most important, our choirs also perform a wide variety of music from around the world, not just Christian music.

>With my Girl Scout troop, I no longer celebrate holidays of ANY kind. I tried to have a December meeting where we learned about the December celebrations of each of the girls in the troop (represented were: Christmas--the Christian kind, Christmas--the pagan devotion to the shopping malls, Hanukah, Divali, and Kwanzaa). BTW, GSUSA considers this a "sensitive issue," and requires a special permission slip signed by parents or the girl cannot stay -- that way the parents know what they're in for. Nobody withdrew their child. The girls *loved* it, and were interested in learning about what their friends did. The parents went ballistic. These parents did NOT want their girls learning about diversity (a basic tenant of Girl Scouting, and I something we strive for in America).

Sorry to hear that the parents from your troop are so narrow-minded. Learning _about_ other cultures is tremendous.

>BTW, his favorite songs are the ones that come from religions/cultures different than his. What's he gonna sing if we take all the songs out of the curriculum that have any basis on religion?

Nathaniel has a buddy who's Christian, from a very religious (and very musical) family. (We went to his baptism when he was about 10.) For whatever reasons, many of Luke's friends are Jewish, so we'd see him at Bar Mitzvah after Bar Mitzvah during that year-and-a-half when this group spent a couple of Saturdays a month in synagogue. We were always amused to see Luke singing along, including on lots of the Hebrew songs that are part of the service.

Tamar