WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (JTA) — Both sides in a church-state standoff are declaring victory in the wake of a split ruling in a case involving a controversial school Bible course in Florida. The decision allows a school district in Lee County, Fla., to teach a course based on the Old Testament, but bars it from teaching one based on the New Testament. The case is important because church-state watchdogs say the Christian Coalition has been looking to Lee County as a test case in its nationwide effort to bring religion into the public schools. Three of the five members on the school board are said to have close ties to the conservative Christian lobby. In the case, seven parents, clergy and other community members — including the president of the local Jewish federation — had filed suit to block the Bible curriculum, claiming that it teaches the Bible as historical fact and indoctrinates students to Christianity. The two-part proposed course would have covered both the Old and New Testaments, but it was the slant of the New Testament version that mainly troubled the local residents. U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Kovachevich said the school board could implement the course based on the Old Testament because it was “ostensibly designed to teach history and not religion,” thereby meeting the requirement that the course had a secular purpose. But she issued an injunction against the use of the New Testament curriculum, ruling that the court “finds it difficult to conceive how the account of the resurrection or of miracles could be taught as secular history.” The American Civil Liberties Union and People For the American Way, two watchdog groups backing the plaintiffs, welcomed the injunction against the New Testament curriculum. “We see this as a kind of stealth curriculum that quite nicely fits into the broad agenda of the religious right in the public schools, which is to begin by first getting your candidates elected” to school boards, “and then start in with a Bible curriculum and prayer in schools,” said Lisa Versaci, Florida state director of People For the American Way. She said the watchdog groups intend to closely monitor and videotape the Old Testament class, which began in late January, to make sure it does not cross the line. For its part, the American Center for Law and Justice, the Virginia-based group created by Christian Coalition leader the Rev. Pat Robertson that has been defending the school board, hailed the decision clearing the way for the Old Testament class. The group said it was reviewing the injunction against the New Testament phase.
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