More Christian Nationalist Public School Mischief Part II "Seven Reasons to Oppose LifeWise Academy in Your School District"

Don't Look Now....Here Comes the Big Red Bus

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Do this little thought experiment with me:

Today is LifeWise Academy Day in your local Iowa public school elementary building. In your school of 400 students, about 175 of them have been eagerly awaiting this day. They all proudly wear their bright red LifeWise t-shirts as a symbol of their participation in the new “release-time for religious instruction” (RTRI) training.

A big red bus pulls up in the school parking lot and stops at the main door. The students who have parental permission to attend begin to be dismissed from their “non-core” classes, such as art, music, P.E., or some other “non-essential” class. As they march out to the bus, they are greeted with smiles and high-fives from the LifeWise staff, who are also distributing candy to the bus riders and wearing their red T-shirts.

The bus carries the excited students away from the schoolhouse to a local church that has agreed to house the LifeWise Academy program. These students are herded into the fellowship hall, where they play a game, win some toy prizes, sing some songs, and then settle in for a Bible lesson provided by a publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention.

During the Bible lesson about marriage, an older student raises their hand to ask a personal question. It goes like this: “My parents are divorced; did they break God’s rules?” The standard answer that all LifeWise teachers respond is: “Mark 10:5-9 tells us that when two people get married, they are joined together in a very special way. God does not want this bond to be broken apart. But God promises that when we repent and confess our sin, He will forgive us.” The teacher recites several supporting scriptures: Gen. 2:24; Mic. 2:16; 1 Jn. 1:9.

When the students return to school an hour or so later, they are on a sugar high and bring the toys they won during the games into their classrooms. The other students look on with envy and secretly wish their parents would permit them to attend. Later in the day, a LifeWise Academy student asks their friend if they “know Jesus,” and when the friend responds, “No, they don’t teach that at my church,” the LifeWise student tells their friend that if they don’t know Jesus, they will go to hell.

Our older student gets home that evening and, with a show of concern on their face, asks their mother if she has repented yet of getting a divorce. The mom asks their child why they are asking such a question. This child put two and two together and said that if they hadn’t repented, then they had sinned, and sinners would go to hell. A tear wells up in the child’s eye.

Welcome to RTRI 2.0.

What is the harm? What is the problem? Is this legal? We’ll deal with these concerns in this column today. But be assured, the scene I just described could be coming to a public school near you soon.

In Part I of this series, I linked to a map (here it is again) from the website “Parents Against LifeWise Academy” that shows where Lifewise is being implemented and where it is being proposed. In Iowa alone, there are over 200 school districts (some large and some small) where the LifeWise “plug-n-play” program is being pursued and proposed.

The local LifeWise staff and volunteers are working diligently to influence and, in some cases, bully local school officials into approving RTRI for their district. In Ohio and some other places, advocates are trying to force legislation to make it mandatory to approve their program.

Their talking points always include these three justifications: 1) it is off school grounds, 2) it is privately funded, 3) and it is parent-permitted. They reiterate that RTRI is Constitutionally protected and has existed for many years. This is true.

However, the way LifeWise Academy conducts its “business model” pushes the boundaries of what is Constitutionally protected and crosses other boundaries for what is ethically or morally appropriate. This article will outline seven reasons you should oppose introducing this program in your local school district. Just because RTRI is legal doesn’t mean that school districts are obligated to approve them—especially not the RTRI 2.0 version. This new version could be called “Christian Nationalism RTRI 2.0.”

After outlining why LifeWise Academy is a bad program for public education, I’ll follow up in Part III with practical steps you and your community can take to oppose and prevent this program from being adopted.

# 1 – This program’s main purpose is proselytizing and recruiting children who are “unchurched.”

In the “core values” statement LifeWise freely admits its goal: “We will be fully committed to the LifeWise vision to reach unchurched public-school students with the gospel.” In RTRI 2.0, the purpose is to recruit and convert students to an evangelical belief system. It is not to provide religious instruction for students who already attend a church.

The founder, Joel Penton, has proclaimed the public school system his “mission field.” Young, impressionable minds are the target. Since only about 21% of Americans attend church regularly, that leaves about 80% of students open to recruitment to an evangelical-like faith.

Church attendance has been falling steadily for over twenty years, and the parents who are choosing not to attend church likely have strong reasons. Many will allow their children to make decisions about religious faith when they are old enough, but religious instruction is not a priority for the majority of American families.

But then comes LifeWise, and through peer pressure and incentives, children begin to beg their parents for permission. LifeWise tactics undercut the authority of parents who have already made decisions about religious instruction for their children. LifeWise doesn’t care.

# 2 – LifeWise engages in tactics that lead to bullying and pressuring other students to attend.

In a statement from the “Freedom From Religion Foundation,” these tactics are called out. Their statement in part reads:

Released time programs can lead to negative consequences for students who do not participate. Released time programs often create uncomfortable distinctions between students as it is obvious which students leave school to attend the program and which stay behind. In communities where a significant portion or majority of students participate in released time bible classes, the students who do not join are inevitably singled out in the eyes of their peers. Released time programs often encourage students to proselytize their peers in an attempt to persuade non-attending students to join the program, leading to bullying.

However, it isn’t just organizations like FFRF that are opposed. The experiences of other students who have been bullied are being reported in the state of Ohio. One third-grade student reported that “she had lost all of her friends” because she used a bad word on the playground. Her former friends turned on her and told her she was going to hell. They would have nothing to do with her. This went on for weeks.

Another young Jewish student has been ostracized along with a few of his friends who are not allowed to attend LifeWise meetings. Instead of getting on the big red fun bus, they have to stay at school in a “study hall” where they can read, play educational games on a computer, or do additional school work while their peers are off on a “fun field trip.” It feels more like punishment. This has led to friction in the home because the young boy wants to go on a fun field trip, too.

Another parent reported that their 9-year-old son told them that one of their friends who attended LifeWise programs told him he was going to hell because he didn’t believe in Jesus. His response to his mother was, “I thought all religions were good, and why would I go to hell? I don’t understand.” This boy’s mother is Methodist, and his father is Hindu.

# 3 – LifeWise Condemns lifestyles that don’t conform to their evangelical views, leading to condemnation for divorces, LGBTQ, and transgender people.

Disrespecting family, friends, community members, leaders, or anyone who is LGBTQ+ is wrong and hateful. LifeWise supports “conversion therapy” for LGBTQ+ people which is known to be psychologically harmful and has lasting damage on the person subject to such abuse. In addition, LifeWise opposes same-sex marriage, as well as transgender and gender-fluid identities.

This has become a major issue in Indiana, where LifeWise has expanded recently. Chris Paulsen, CEO of LGBTQ+ rights advocacy group Indiana Youth Group, voiced concern that children can receive Christian religious instruction during the school day “yet no one can talk about queer families.” Indiana bans “human sexuality” instruction in schools through third grade.

When children hear these ideas during the school day, they believe they are true and are supported by the school district and teachers. They are not old enough to distinguish the nuances of the separation of church and state yet. The idea that LGBTQ+ people are a sin and the idea that their existence angers someone's God is simply wrong and abusive. Sending children back to school with these ideas is wrong. Evangelizing children, some of whom already have a religious affiliation, is wrong. This is not how missionary projects should work, and public schools are not mission fields, despite what LifeWise employees have said.

# 4—Losing crucial class time and implying that some classes aren’t important sends a bad message about the value of education.

LifeWise deliberately requests that students be released from “non-core classes” to attend their brand of religious instruction. Why not just release them during the lunch or recess hour? LifeWay has data. They know the number of participating students will almost double if they miss a class. If students miss lunch or recess, roughly only 21% of students will sign up for LifeWise. If they miss a class, the sign-ups go to around 43%. This is predatory and should not be allowed.

Additionally, when have classes such as art, music, PE, or other courses been deemed “non-essential?” If they are non-essential, why are they offered at all? Some students who excel in these courses are missing a critical piece of their education. Instead, they miss necessary instructional time so they can be brainwashed through religious indoctrination.

If you take the example at the beginning of this article and say 175 students are out of a class for 60 minutes a week, that represents an aggregated total of 10,500 hours a week. If you multiply that by 32 weeks of a school year, that number rises to 336,000 hours of lost educational time. This is an intolerable waste of educational time, money, and effort. The impact of lifelong learning loss is yet to be felt.

# 6 – LifeWise lacks transparency into its program, staff qualifications, and other essential reporting requirements.

LifeWise has repeatedly denied full access to the curriculum that they teach. LifeWise will say the curriculum is copyrighted, which is why it cannot be shown. It is true LifeWise pays for access to the curriculum and does not own it. But that does not mean it cannot be shared. Libraries are filled with copyrighted material that everyone can read and has access to. They have chosen not to allow parents and members of the public to see their curriculum. What are they hiding?

You can review the curriculum on the “Parents Against LifeWise Academy” website. They have gained access and posted it there, but LifeWise has sued them for doing so. Schools, parents, and other interested parties should, it seems to me, have access to their curriculum just as schools are required now to post their curriculum online. It is in the name of transparency.

Additionally, LifeWise does not provide transparency regarding staff hiring, training, and background checks. Although they claim to check their workers thoroughly, they do not publicly account for this. You have no idea the record of the people working with children.

In mandatory reporting, LifeWise circumvents the public reporting of abuse that public school teachers must follow. Their process is “internal” and doesn’t encourage reporting abuse cases to the proper authorities. Although they are a private non-profit organization and are free from some of the exact requirements, the fact that they are not forthcoming regarding their process should raise huge red flags.

# 7—LifeWise uses the school district to promote and recruit students to attend its program, a clear violation of the Constitution.

If you attend a Back to School Night, Parent-Teacher Association meeting, or other school event, you may see a LifeWise Academy booth. Sometimes, school officials who are sympathetic to the program or unaware that this sort of use is unconstitutional will allow them to have a presence on their campus.

Additionally, LifeWise often requests that schools send home flyers or other communications to parents with official school packets. They sometimes post a link to their website on school documents. They are not shy about getting the school system to do its work for them. Again, this is unconstitutional.

Ultimately, LifeWise is not what they say it is. They claim to be non-denominational, yet all their curriculum comes from the Southern Baptist Convention. They claim not to be predatory, yet everything they do targets students and families who have chosen a different religious faith or none at all. To LifeWise, the public school is their “mission field.”

In Part III, I share some ways communities can prevent LifeWise Academy from encroaching on their children in public schools. The first step is to be aware of this organization’s tactics and goals. We have uncovered that in Parts I & II. Part III will help you take action.