Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 10, 1993 TAG: 9301080229
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: JACK CHAMBERLAIN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SCHOOL BOARD SPEAKERS PASSIONATE, POLITE
At first I thought I was walking into a scene from "Inherit The Wind."Just inside the packed lobby of the Christiansburg High School auditorium, as folks milled around, talked and laughed, and trickled into the cavernous auditorium, about a dozen people were joyously singing "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."
One was strumming a guitar, while the others held white sheets of paper with the words.
"Glory, glory, hallelujah. . . ."
Several teen-age girls carried hand-lettered signs. One was wearing a "Mickey Mouse" sweat shirt. A statement of fashion, I presumed, and not of politics.
Outside on a mild Tuesday night the school parking lot was nearly full. Inside, the auditorium, which seats more than 1,000, was nearly full.
Christiansburg policemen and Montgomery County sheriff's deputies seemed to be everywhere, wary and serious, as if they expected a religious war to break out.
It didn't.
In fact, the vast audience seemed in a festive mood. Everyone, pro and con, was orderly and polite, even somewhat docile, except for some partisan "amens" for their side, cries of "Time! Time!" when the other side seemed to talk too long, and a occasional booing of a liberal statement.
The speakers, pro and con, expressed themselves with eloquent fervor, and pretty much stuck to their allotted three minutes apiece.
The occasion was the Montgomery County School Board's first meeting since controversy erupted over the board's earlier decisions to religiously neutralize traditional Christian holidays on official documents, such as school calendars and personnel policy manuals.
After the board opened the meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance, a woman commented to a friend: "I'm surprised they let us say the pledge. It says, `Under God.' "
Easter had quietly become spring break a decade ago on the calendars the kids bring home; Christmas had quietly become winter break about five years ago.
Nobody seemed to notice at the time, and life went on. School holidays came and went as always.
Last spring, School Board Chairman Daniel Schneck of Christiansburg noticed that the employee policy manual still referred to Christmas and Easter holidays. So the board unanimously neutralized it to be sensitive to employees who might not follow the Christian religion.
Still, no one seemed to notice - until December when a newspaper story about another school system in Northern Virginia quoted Schneck on the issue. He resigned after the Board of Supervisors, facing a crowd of about 300 protesters, resolved to support Christmas and Easter on the school documents.
At Tuesday night's meeting, it was clear that most folks were fired up to have the words "Christmas" and "Easter" back on the calendar and in the policy manual, even though the days off called winter and spring breaks have been the same as always.
They viewed the Christian holiday designations as symbols of their Christian religion, their Christian heritage, their country, which they argued was founded on Christian principles, and they considered their removal as another step toward damnation.
Jim Sutphin, the first to address the board, set the tone when he implored the crowd, "If you believe in a true living God, stand with us for a moment of prayer."
Most did.
No one seemed opposed to Christianity, but speakers supporting the board's decision viewed the Christian holiday designations as insensitive to other religions, and unconstitutional as well. They argued that the Constitution prohibits the state - i.e., public schools - from promoting a particular religion.
Anti-board forces argued just as fervently that the Constitution has been misconstrued and misinterpreted by liberals.
"This is a conspiracy toward God, Hallelujah," the Rev. Jack Sacco boomed into the mike. Television crews, apparently semisedated by previous speakers, bolted awake and zoomed in on Sacco's evangelistic sound and video opportunity.
"Two thousand years ago when little Jesus came to be born they didn't have room for him then and they don't have room for him now," Sacco said to applause and "amens" from the crowd.
John LeDoux, an associate professor at Virginia Tech and chairman of the county chapter of Rev. Pat Robertson's Christian coalition, said the teaching of Indian traditions and meditation in county schools is opening the minds of youths to "demonic spirits."
If the board is doing away with Christmas and Easter, someone else said, it should do away with Halloween, too.
After the designated hour was up, Vice Chairman Roy Vickers said the board would consider the calendar again in April and called a five-minute recess.
And the murmuring crowd quietly faded into the night, through the double doors of Christiansburg High, home of the fighting Demons.
Jack Chamberlain is the Roanoke Times & World-News' assistant New River editor.