Back-to-Cruel: A Pastor’s Perspective on School Takeovers

This past Sunday we had our Back-to-school breakfast and blessed our children on their upcoming journeys back to school. We blessed their backpacks, their teachers, and their Sunday school teachers. And since then, I’ve been thinking a lot about just how vital it is currently to advocate for our kids and their teachers amid constant changes within the school system, state takeovers, and the consequences of Christian nationalist influences in those spaces.

As kids return to school, I can’t help but wonder what will be different for them when they enter their classrooms. Teachers have been leaving their positions at shockingly alarming rates. In Houston, three years into the state takeover of public schools, HISD Public Information Request Data showed that 47 schools lost at least half of their teachers last year, 12 schools lost 70% of their teachers, and two schools lost all their teachers entirely within the school year. Having heard several stories from my fiance, one of many who left a teaching position with HISD, working conditions for teachers in these schools are unrealistic, unsustainable, and cruel. This is not only disheartening from the perspective of our educators, but such instability has shown to be detrimental to the students, their patterns of relationship building, and their retention of information.

Christian nationalist influences within the school system have benefitted religious schools through the voucher program, and contributed to bills which allow for chaplains to be hired at public schools in place of licensed professional counselors. However, it’s important to know that the National School Chaplain Association does not require any formal theological education to be certified through their accelerated online training program. References to the Bible have been added to curricula, as well as the mandate that The Ten Commandments be prominently displayed in all public-school classrooms across the state of Texas, lest the children forget the commandment to be faithful to their spouses. 

As a Christian pastor, I bring up these political issues because Christianity has historically been deeply political. While Christian nationalism has been anything but Christian. It has absolutely nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus. I do not believe that matters of the state should be based on, or influenced by, Christianity for several reasons, but, hypothetically, if Christianity were to be modeled within the public school system, then cuts would not have been made to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), forcing schools around Texas to end automatic universal free lunches at schools. There are over 100 references to feeding the hungry and sharing food with others within the pages of scripture. You can’t miss it.

There is much I could touch on, but for now, I will end with this: teachers deserve livable wages and the agency to nurture creativity within their classrooms. Students deserve stability throughout the school year, and full bellies while they learn. And as a leader within the church, I remain dedicated to calling out Christian nationalism, and stand with all those committed to systemic change within the school systems. Blessings for the coming school year.