Weeding Out the Godless Texans

While students in Texas remembered God in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of American, the writers of the pledge to the flag of Texas left this out. They have now corrected this oversight:

This year’s Legislature added the phrase “one state under God” to the pledge, which is part of a required morning ritual in Texas public schools along with the pledge to the U.S. flag and a moment of silence.

State Rep. Debbie Riddle, who sponsored the bill, said it had always bothered her that God was omitted in the state’s pledge.

“Personally, I felt like the Texas pledge had a big old hole in it, and it occurred to me, ‘You know what? We need to fix that,’ ” said Riddle, R-Tomball. “Our Texas pledge is perfectly OK like it is with the exception of acknowledging that just as we are one nation under God, we are one state under God as well.”

We are dealing with young children who might have short attention spans (think Lil’ Bush) and therefore this must be drummed into them twice. Texans also were reminded why George Bush Sr. railed against “card carrying members of the ACLU” and other liberal organizations:

Most Texans do not need to say this new version of the pledge in order to be either patriotic or religious,” said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. “This is the kind of politicking of religion that disturbs many Americans, including those who are deeply religious.”

The revised Texas pledge is “Honor the Texas flag; I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible.” Students who object to saying the pledge or this reference to God must bring a written note from home excusing them from participating.

I wonder if the country would be a better place if, instead of repeating these pledges every day, schools took a few moments to remember the principles upon which this nation was originally formed, including separation of church and state, along with some thoughts on better toleration of the views of others.

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