avi@pegasus.UUCP (02/14/84)
Jon "nscu!" Mauney made an excellent suggestion. The only way to have equal time in teaching religion in schools is to give everybody a chance. He suggests 5 minutes per day, with a different religion each day. His estimate is that the Moral [Majority] will get to hear their kind of prayer about 10% of the time. I think his estimate was several orders of magnitude too high. If we eliminate most "similar" religions, then Christianity, as well as Judaism and Islam will have very few five minute periods. On the other hand, just as in the United Nations, many of the island countries, and large parts of Africa, Asia, Australia, and American Indians will supply many thousands of absolutely distinct religions -- some with under a dozen followers. If we throw the door open for religions that no longer exist, then the "MAJOR" religions may never get a free 5 minute advertising period till after the year 2000 (by which time some say the world won't be here anymore!). I doubt that many of the advocates of "prayer" in the schools would appreciate this! For an (incomplete) list of available deities/religions, you may wish to consult Tim Maroney about the tenets of Thelemism. My five minutes is almost up. Do I have enough time to ask how many forms of Agnosticism there ar<EOF> -- -=> Avi E. Gross @ AT&T Information Systems Laboratories (201) 576-6241 suggested paths: [ihnp4, allegra, cbosg, hogpc, ...]!pegasus!avi