To counter a city Bible Week resolution, a group of MSU students plans to ask the East Lansing City Council to honor Church/State Separation Week.
The resolution, which the council approved during its Oct. 14 work session, designates Nov. 23-30 as Bible Week in East Lansing. Mayor Mark Meadows said it's about the eighth year the council has recognized the event.
At Tuesday's council meeting, a group of students representing the MSU Freethinker Alliance addressed the council with their concerns regarding its passage of the proposal.
"Claiming that recognizing the week does not amount to an endorsement is splitting hairs," psychology senior Jessica Leiby said. "The city council's stamp of approval serves to promote the agenda of the organizations backing Bible Week."
National Bible Week, in its 63rd year, takes place during Thanksgiving week and is sponsored by the National Bible Association.
East Lansing received a letter from The Rutherford Institute in Charlottesville, Va., on behalf of the National Bible Association, encouraging the city to recognize the proposal. The institute specializes in religious civil rights work.
John Whitehead, president of the institute, said honoring the week is constitutionally permissable because most of the country was founded on religion.
Though the council approved the resolution, members said they don't directly endorse the week, and it was just one of many resolutions the council approves almost weekly.
But some alliance members are curious as to why the city council chose to recognize the event.
"If a resolution like Bible Week doesn't advance religion, I don't know what does," English senior Roger Smith said. "In the unlikely event that all who voted in favor of the resolution can honestly say they didn't intend to endorse the Bible, this action still has the effect of the very same."
The Freethinker Alliance, which began in 2002, is a group of about 25 MSU students who do not to follow a specific religion and encourage others to keep an open mind about theology. The alliance plans to present the council with their own resolution for Church/State Separation Week, hoping it will be recognized in the same fashion as Bible Week. Should council deny the resolution, the alliance said they will still hold activities on campus to honor the week.
Church/State Separation Week is a national event celebrated at roughly the same time as Bible Week and is sponsored by groups such as Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
The alliance hopes to have a draft of its resolution in front of city council by Friday, so the council can address it at its following Tuesday work session.
Psychology senior Susan Wise said she acknowledges the right the council has to accept resolutions but was unclear about the motives.
"We need to ask ourselves whether or not council should be getting involved," Wise said. "The resources of the city council are better spent doing other things."
Councilmember Bill Sharp said he welcomed the alliance's comments during the meeting and is willing to look at whatever the group presents to city council.
"Anybody that comes in front of us I would listen to," Sharp said. "We're an open enough council that if it's within legal boundaries and decency, we'd look at it."
