Loading ...Prom gets Baptist student suspended
flockwoodHigh school prom is a rite of passage, as American as apple pie. But going to the big dance at a public school got an Ohio boy suspended from his fundamentalist Baptist private Christian school. The senior, Tyler Frost, won’t be allowed to participate in his high school graduation.
The fundamentalists are unhappy with Frost because he 1.) danced, 2.) listened to rock music while he danced and 3.) held hands with his date while he danced. I kid you not.
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May 13th, 2009 at 6:59 am
AND YOU ARE HAPPY with Frost because he 1.) danced, 2.) listened to rock music while he danced and 3.) held hands with his date while he danced. I kid you not.
May 13th, 2009 at 8:15 am
Frank–Did you ever hear why fundamentalists are not allowed to have sex standing up?
Someone might think they were dancing.
No charge for that one.
Jim Workman
from Greenville, SC, area–home of Bob Jones University
May 13th, 2009 at 9:39 am
On the legal merits, I think the school is well within its rights. On the theological merits, they are not.
Dancing, rock music, and hand-holding are not intrinsically sinful and no church is called to police our hearts. Churches are to preach the Gospel so that we are convicted of sin by the Holy Spirit, repent, and live lives of obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ.
The heart is always the issue, and making dancing, proms, and secular music the enemy, the fundie Baptists do violence to the Gospel.
I pray they repent of their religion and seek to proclaim Christ and Him crucified.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
I grew up in a very rural county in Eastern Kentucky in which most of the population was either Baptist of some stripe or pentecostal of some stripe. Given that pentecostals dance in church, I’m not sure of their take on dancing, but the Baptists were certainly against it. The (one) public high school in the county, from which I graduated, never had a dance or prom while I was there, though they may have relaxed that in the (many) years since. No one ever said this out loud, but I’m convinced that the reason they never had any event where a student could reasonably either dance or listen to rock music was to appease the Baptists.
May 13th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
I’m with you Caleb, the Bible starts with Genesis and then goes through the New Testament, thats all about progression through my eyes.
Its hard to believe that an 18 year old kid can blend these particular religious beliefs and the freedoms of the constitution without feeling oppressed. I think its wrong for the school to ban him from the prom and the word prom is the wrong word for the gathering, it should be a religious social.
May 14th, 2009 at 7:36 pm
I do not understand where the Churches doctrine of no dancing comes from. King David is said to have done a jig or two and God loved and cherished him.
Many times the churches have ‘burdened’ the christian and this is supposedly what Jesus came to set free.
May 14th, 2009 at 8:58 pm
Beliefs like these can be compared, I think, to the beliefs of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and scribes, who spent too much time, looking “beyond the mark.”
May 15th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Perhaps true, David, though as Frank has reported here, the Pharisees at least are getting a second look from religious scholars who think they might have gotten a bad rap in scripture. The Sadducees and scribes, I suppose, are on their own.
May 21st, 2009 at 5:02 am
A friend of mine in his first United Methodist parish was approached by his youth because the school board was controlled by Baptists and Church of Christ members who would not allow a prom. At their request the Methodist Church sponsored a prom. Most Baptist and Church of Christ students attended. Their was an interesting book “No Dancin in Anson” about a small town north of Abiliene, TX where the school board banned dances and the local christian militia enforced the ruling off campus. It is an interesting read for anyon who may end up pastoring in rural Texas. The local folk wonder why the kids don’t remain in the “wonderful” small town after high school.
May 30th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
So sad. . . .and I’m sure such publicity ensures healthy, spiritually whole people just flock in the doors of their churches. . . .