Source: www.wickedlocal.com
NEWTON, MASSACHUSETTS, December 16, 2009: Newton South High School officials dropped a requirement to read excerpts from the Bible for one student last month, after he refused to read the Biblical passages as a literature assignment because he is an atheist.
South Principal Joel Stembridge wouldn’t comment on the case, but said the school uses the Bible to introduce students to the cultural traditions and allusions found in much of Western literature.
All sophomores study parts of the Bible as literature as part of 10th-grade English classes, along with Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities,” “Antigone” and works by Shakespeare.
In the 1963 United States Supreme Court case School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, the court ruled that schools can use the Bible and other religious works for studying literature and culture, so long as it’s not used to proselytize.