“What’s that you’re doing, Miss Wilson?”

“I’m putting together a new curriculum for my science class next fall, Mr. Jones, now that Judge Hand has said that Secular Humanism is a religion in Alabama. It seems that the problem has been that I’ve ignored religion in the past, so I suppose the answer is to include them all.”

“All?”

“Yes, including Secular Humanism. You see, I’ll tell the kids that there are many different ways of viewing nature and that we don’t know which of them is right, so we’re going to teach all of them and let the children make up their minds.”

“Which religions would you include?”

“I’ve got the school year divided into four parts. The first part would be called “Fundamentalist Science.” We would read the first book of the Bible and discuss the logic God had in mind when creating the world. Then, in the next section, I would introduce Secular Humanist Science as another religious viewpoint. I would summarize Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection.”

“But how is that a religion? You didn’t mention God.”

“Judge Hand says it’s a religion, so that’s how I’m going to teach it. The third unit would cover the religions of the East. The world would be presented as a cosmic web in which every individual is really a part of everything, and the purpose of nature is to put a veil over this fundamental truth so that people must ponder it.”

“Won’t it be kind of hard for the children to grasp the idea of nature as an illusion? For that matter, what are they to make of any of this?”

“Fifth graders are pretty sophisticated these days.”

“But you’re telling them there is no truth about nature, only opinion. Isn’t it a lot to expect them to figure out for themselves which “religion” is correct? And once they choose, won’t they always have lingering doubts about whether the one they choose actually is correct or just a convenient way of ordering what is no doubt just chaos? Are our children to be foisted on the adult world of uncertainty and relativism at such a tender age?”

“What would you have me do? Don’t give me this hue and cry about relativism now. Where were you when the fundamentalists were banning books?”

“Busy searching lockers for drugs, I suspect.”

“You see, you didn’t take them seriously, Mr. Jones.”

“No, I didn’t. Well, what will you do for your last unit? You said you had four.”

“I’m going to talk about animism. Millions of people still believe this, and we have no right to say that their belief is inferior to fundamentalist, secular or Eastern views. For the animist, the world is full of dead ancestors and spirits and gods.”

“Gods?”

“Yes, gods. Look, I’m just trying to be fair.”

“Somehow I don’t think this is what the fundamentalists had in mind when they said that because secular humanism was a religion they should have their religion taught in the schools as well. I think they just wanted to replace secular teachings with their religious beliefs, and this was the only legal argument they could make.”

“It used to be we didn’t force kids to make up their minds about all this until they were old enough to deal with it. But now, they must choose early between religion and science and give up the one they didn’t choose as completely untrue. Then they walk around for the rest of their days confronted by the opposition. It’s a very disconcerting way to live, on a tightrope over an abyss of subjectivity.”

“But perhaps we’re being a bit maudlin, Miss Wilson. After all, most children won’t even pay attention to any of this.”

“That’s the only comfort I have, Mr. Jones. Fifth grade’s hard enough without nihilism.”

“Maybe you should make that unit five. Sounds like a religion to me.”