Christians are once again doing their best to keep up their image as unloving a-holes.
Fourth-grade teacher Jarretta Hamilton was newly married and expecting a baby when she went to speak with her supervisors in April of last year. But the administrators at Southland Christian School in St. Cloud parried her query about maternity leave with a query of their own: When did she conceive? After Hamilton admitted that her child had been conceived about three weeks before her February 20, 2009, wedding, the school fired her. But you know how I feel. I'm curious, what do you all think. Should the school have fired her?
No. She should have been brought to the front of a whole-school assembly and then shamed in front of everyone by giving her 4 lashings with a wet noodle.
But instead, in the name of Christ (presumably) she is rejected by her christian “family”, sent away to live with no support (money), etc.
She should file a wrongful dismissal suite. I haven’t a clue what kind of idiotic “agreement” or contract she signed with the school.. but surely the bad publicity of this policy would be enough to at least get her a few bucks worth of severence…
I remember one of our gym teachers got knocked-up out of wedlock when I was in middle school WAAAAAAY back during the Reagan administration. I thought at the time that it was a weird example for us youngins, particularly since it had been drilled into my head at home that marriage came before sex came before marriage.though my views on the subject have changed, I still have a mental scarlet letter next to my memory of her.
Minnesota zealots are extra-weird.
I’m fine with the school firing her…they have standards and rules and as we all know, premarital sex is a big time no-no.
It seems harsh and judgemental…but isn’t that what Christian School is all about?
Herni, that is hilarious.
One thing I learned from attending CCHS/CBC was that if you got pregnant outside of marriage as a teenager you were most definitely standing up in front of the youth group next to whichever youth pastor knew you the best (and if there wasn’t one then Doug was the default), crying and apologizing. The one time I actually saw this happen the girl was by herself because I think the guy she was dating went to another church. At the time I fully believed that sex before marriage was wrong and I was PISSED that she was up there by herself. Or at all really.
There were probably girls who got pregnant who chose not to do this…I just think that you didn’t see much of them after that. Like if you chose not to humiliate yourself in front of a bunch of strangers then you were disregarded.
And as much as it annoys me that this is even an issue anywhere (premarital sex/pregnancy), I also kind of don’t have a problem with them firing her. Mostly because as Johnpaul said, every school of that nature is going to have some sort of “code of conduct” with rules & guidelines that you must adhere to if you want to work there. Warner Pacific College has similar “rules” and you cannot work there if you have sex outside of marriage. I may hate that those rules exist, but those places have every right to make them and enforce them. If she had been excommunicated or shunned from her church for the same thing, I would have something different to say about it.
Personally, I wouldn’t have answered their request for that kind of information. It’s none of their business. Technically, they can fire her for any reason. Should they have? “Let he who is without sin…”
However, I think if Christians are going to fire each other over sin, they are being unfairly discriminatory. Why this one? Why not the sin of leaving your dirty coffee cup in the sink of the teacher’s lounge? Why not gossiping about the principal’s wife? Why not the sin of coveting the English teacher’s car? What about the sin of naughty thoughts regarding the cute librarian? These are all sins that violate the rules of conduct. Some are worse than others, I guess.
I do think she has a good case against the school. They revealed private information that was damaging to her reputation and employability. Also know as the sin of gossip. I’ll be no one is getting fired over that.
Belteshazzar…what information do you have about this? Who was it? Who gossiped about the priniciples wife? We need names….right now. This is serious business. For the sake of the Lord we need to know who is doing these things so the appropriate steps can be taken. Stand not in the way of God’s annointed…give us the names now or we will be forced to call your parents…you don’t want to embarrass your family do you?
My question is, what point is the school trying to make? If you’re honest and ‘fess up, you’ll get in trouble? This woman could have very easily chosen to “move” her due date up a couple of weeks and then have an “early” birth. But she was honest and admitted her premarital activity.
Maybe their point is that being sorry is useless, rules are rules, and no grace for you! Maybe their point is that only apparent sins are fire-worthy. If she slept with future hubby but hadn’t gotten pregnant, she would still have a job.
I had thought that biblically the ultimate punishment (banishment from the church) was reserved for the openly unrepentant and continually rebellious. Maybe this woman is in that category, but it sure doesn’t sound like it.
I won’t chime in on whether or not they should have fired her (that would lead to a rant), but will state that they had to fire her. I would imagine that every wonderful/scared-to-death-of-the-real-world family would pull their child out of that school for fear that their own kids would get pregnant from being witness to this example.
However, this is pretty much the modus operandi for christian schools. She may have been the best teacher they have, but that takes a second fiddle to staying true to certain doctrinal beliefs. Real teachers and real content aren’t as important as hammering biblical “truths” into kid’s heads five days a week.
But, what’s the big deal? After all, how bad could it be to have kids going into college not ever being exposed to pre-marital sex, while still thinking that the earth is 10,000 years old? It’s not like this will handicap them in a real university and the real world… right?
It will when they all end up at Bible College…
[Comment ID #37829 Will Be Quoted Here]
Haha, yeah. The local “Bible College” in my neck of the woods is Northwest University. It’s pretty much the one that everyone at TCC goes to, if they don’t go the the UW.
Note their acceptance rate:
http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/kirkland-wa/northwest-university-3783
Haha! That keeps the standards high… 100.0% acceptance rate. Is that information true? What if they’re not Christians?
Pretty sure it is relatively accurate—US News & World Report is ‘the’ ranking system that all universities kiss-up to. The universities provide much of that info themselves. As far as requirements go:
http://www.northwestu.edu/admissions/requirements/preadmission.php
You have to say that JC is your lord and savior, and someone has to vouch for you. However, I know people that can’t get into any other schools, and as a result pretty much just have someone at a church write them a letter—from there, you are good to go.
In terms of their programs, they are pretty much a joke/typical bible college ( http://www.northwestu.edu/undergraduate/ ). They do offer a nursing program, and I know that people who can’t get into a nursing program elsewhere will go that route.
From my experience with classmates that I went to private (Christian) school with, this is a popular route to go if your parents have money, are involved in church. You can get an easy (otherwise useless) degree and go and be a children’s pastor somewhere—your parents feel good inside, and you get to pop out babies (conceived after marriage, of course) and be a youth pastor for the next 20 years (until you’re too old to be hip).
Oh, and TCC poaches (steals) from their student body for their Generation Interns program. Though I make fun of Northwest “Universityâ€, I am pretty sure that a degree from there is worth a little more than an internship from TCC—though, you might not learn how to wash Judah’s car if you don’t choose the latter…
I saw a piece on this on one of the news shows last week. What we thought was especially weird was the school felt the need to tell all her students (i think they are 4th graders) that she conceived before she was married. i don’t know about you, but when i was a kid, i didn’t really want to think about my teacher having a body let alone having sex with anybody! gah! Were they trying to use this as a teachable moment? Give me a break!
The bottom line was probably money. The principal was probably p.o.ed that he was going to have to pay maternity leave so thought to get out of it by pulling the ‘just when did you conceive this child’ card. I bet he didn’t count on being sued by the teacher!
That’s just really sad. Okay, I totally understand why they had to let her go, but have they never done anything wrong or sinned? I’m sure they have – and just don’t openly confess it… but how open was she? I mean, she answered her boss with an honest answer… and now the country knows about it. Seriously, isn’t that a serious breach of privacy and trust? Why did the school have to tell the students? Spare the details and let the kids grow up normally… no need to speed it up. I didn’t even understand about those things until highschool. How traumatizing it would have been if I found out when I was in 4th grade! What? My teacher does THAT?! But, beyond anything else, this teacher now has no income with a baby on the way and having just gotten married. It’s really heartless.
Wow. Someone forgot to teach common sense to a young Christian woman. How would anyone know this was an early delivery date if not told so. However, given this young lady’s sex drive preempts her God given brains the two OOPS seem to go together. Christian in kind is a living spirital organism- this was strickly a business decision based on a contractual agreement this young lady had with her employer. If drinking and smoking are also in the contract perhaps he who thew the first stone should also be stoned in the process, contractually speaking of course. There are tests available to examine tabacco and alchol use I wonder if the deciders of this lame brained women would submit themselves to the test and resign if shown postive (so as to speak?) Just curious!!!
Matthew 9:13
“But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”