Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) parents send their children to Adventist schools because they want Christian education for their children instead of government education. They also hope to protect their children from this corrupt generation (Acts 2:40).
Christian education requires sacrifices. For most families, the government school bus goes right by their house, and it’s pretty convenient. There is no extra tuition cost for government school, but Seventh-day Adventist schools cost extra.
When Adventist parents sacrifice financially to send their kids to Adventist schools, shouldn’t they have the assurance that the moral heart of their children will be protected? They absolutely should.
Here are two incidents from Florida SDA schools in the past two weeks, that call for parents to be aware of what their children are being exposed to.
Walker Memorial Academy
Testimony from a parent,
“I am a mother of an 11 years old in central Florida. My son attends a private [Adventist] Christian school here. Walker Memorial Academy belongs to the seventh day Adventist church. This school seems to have no control on what the curriculum for the students will be. The Florida conference SDA are who vet and approve curriculum here. This past Thursday I had to go to the school and report a book my son is reading together as a class. While driving home from school my son normally tells me how his day went and he mentioned that in class they read something strange in the book they are reading together. He told me the teacher said to pay no mind to it but all the kids giggled and laughed about it. I was shocked when my son told me that two men kissed!!”
Adultery — One story was about a beautiful woman ( flirts with all the men) married to a not so good looking man. She apparently makes her husbands best friend her lover. They trick the husband into a barrel with a fake vision from God to be able to kiss in the long hours of the night. While this scene is happening another man in town, whom she has lead on so much he at one point that they would elope together, came tapping on her window, asking for a kiss.
Witchcraft — "Touch that cat again" she shouted " and I will unstop this bottle of rats blood and viper's flesh and summon the devil, who will change you into women, and henceforth each of you will giggle like a woman and wear dresses like a woman and give birth like a woman!"
The book is full of adultery, desire for beautiful woman, lying, other gods, mocking God, another story about a man who is ok with letting his wife go with another man because of a joke she thought couldn't happen. Overall strange and inappropriate book for kids.
They removed the book immediately when I showed it to the principal. He agreed it was inappropriate material for 11-years olds. But he called me later, to tell me the Florida conference said that the book is being read in order to teach the 7 deadly sins. But the books have been removed from class.”
The book in question is the Canterbury Tales, a book that was banned in the United States by the U.S. Postal Service, in 1873 who refused to mail it, stating that it contained obscene, filthy, and inappropriate material.
The curriculum that the Florida Conference is using is called Wit and Wisdom. After questioning the appropriateness of the Canterbury Tales to be used in a curriculum to teach young children, the book was temporarily removed and replaced with The Midwife’s Apprentice which also has serious moral issues.
On Monday, the parents received a letter from the principal stating that the Conference decided to continue having the school children read the Canterbury tales.
Florida Conference promises a Christ-centered curriculum. Are they delivering on that promise? You decide.
The Florida Conference educational director said that the current curriculum was vetted and approved, so it must be ok. So they will continue to use it.
North Tampa Christian Academy
After all this was made semi-public on a Facebook Page this week, other parents in Florida began to be more diligent about the things their children were exposed to in SDA schools. A parent at one of our Tampa schools decided to ask her son if he had ever read anything inappropriate at school. He sent her the screenshots below the very next day!
This is rape. To their credit, the Tampa school has removed this book from the classroom. It begs the question. Why was it there in the first place??
As to the Canterbury Tales and other required reading material for students, the Florida Conference has dug in their heels by saying they vetted the material beforehand, as if that makes it all right.
It is not the vetting process that makes material for children acceptable, but rather if it lines up with the biblical principles of human sexuality and purity.
Commentary
Parents, be aware of what your children are being exposed to at our SDA Christian schools. You may be paying for a Christian education, but you may be getting considerably less than what you bargained for.
Friends, we should do everything we can to protect the children of this great Movement from sexual abuse and moral defilement/failure. It’s very important today. The examples cited above wound the conscience of our young people. That is not acceptable.
Our schools should not use material that defiles the heart of our children. It is ok to discuss (but not in detail) wrong moral actions in order to teach what the Bible says about moral purity. But, care should be taken not to defile our children's hearts in the process.
There are so many uplifting stories that could inspire our young people with Godly principles. Why use material from the refuse pile of the world?
This educational system is brought to you by the same conference that attempted to ban Doug Bachelor from speaking in any FLC church in the state of Florida in 2015.
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"I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you" (Romans 16:19-20).