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Get Them While They're Young: Fundamentalists Proselytizing in the Park
[UPDATE: Turns out this was going on last year too. See this 2007 blog. It also suggests either the organization's leaders are liars, or the organization's volunteers are actually violating their own standards in addition to the law and common decency.]
[UPDATE II: Given that the 2007 article suggests that this is all against the organization's stated policies, in addition to reporting problems to the Park Administration as outlined below...
Turns out the CEF is denying any connection with this practice...see their statement at the bottom.]
Would like to pass along something from the Park Slope Parents List. Seems a fundamentalist Christian group is proselytizing kids in playgrounds without parent's permission:
FYI, the fundamentalist christian groups are back for the season proselytizing to children without parents consent in our playgrounds. Last year CEF handed out candy and coloring books but asked the kids first if they accepted Jesus Christ as their personal savior. This national para-church (CEF, Child Evanglism Fellowship) comes to urban playgrounds through local church sponsorship with the sole purpose of converting children. It is actually very difficult to discern if the
proselyters are CEF because they seem to hide behind their local sponsorship. If this practice is offensive to you, I advise you to call the parks department, ask the proseltyzers for their permits and then call the parks officers (they rarely have a permit and they should not be handing out things to children).XXXXX
not against fundamentalist christians, just any form of religious
proselyting in a public playground
This is positively disgusting to me. As a parent I wouldn't want ANYONE to be approaching my kid trying to indoctrinate them on ANYTHING unless they check with me first. Let's also remember this is a diverse community and it is disrespectful to parents to try and convert their children in playgrounds without parental consent. It is also against the posted rules of these playgrounds for any parent to enter unless accompanying kids and it is against the rules for anyone to be soliciting or handing out flyers in playgrounds without permits. These people are breaking laws and disrespecting parents. This is also a safety issue. How do we, as parents, have a clue who these people are recruiting in playgrounds?
Also from the Park Slope Parents List comes a reply from the Prospect Park Press Director:
Hi all: I'm the Press Director at Prospect Park. I thought I'd sharewith the list some basic info on "rules" regarding handing out flyers in public Parks and playgrounds.
1) Any individual or group wishing to pass out flyers in a public park must get a permit from the Parks Dept. This includes those wishing to hand out flyers of a religious nature.
This is NOT a restriction of first amendment rights of expression: the permit process is used to make sure the activity is held in a suitable location (one that does not impede access to facilities, pathways, etc). A playground is not a suitable area for passing out flyers.
[Editor's note: I have seen the NYC permit process be used to curtail First Amendment rights by the Bloomberg Administration. And I have complained about it. In this case I have to say the permit process is logical and a matter of safety and respect for the parents of the children in the playground]
2) Adults in a playground area should be those accompany minors. Adults without minors should not be in playgrounds.
THAT SAID, these rules are enforced with some common sense: an elderly couple enjoying the sun on a Park bench within a playground area is not going to be asked to leave by Park Enforcement Patrol (PEP) or the NYPD. It's also likely that someone passing out flyers in a busy area may not exactly draw the attention of PEP or NYPD officers as a problem needing to be addressed.
IF you observe an individual or group doing something you think may be against Park rules - such as handing out flyers - report it to a PEP or NYPD officer. I know someone posted a note to the list saying they did report the flyering activity it to a police officer, and the officer said he could do nothing about it. The reality is some officers may not be fully versed in Park rules. The best thing to do in all situations is to also call 311 and make a complaint.
Both the Parks Department and the NYPD take 311 complaints seriously. You can also follow-up with 311 on a complaint. If there are playgrounds that need better patrols, calling 311 and asking for such will get results.
As well as reporting their concerns to the City's 311 system, the public can also call the Prospect Park Administrator's office at (718) 965-8951. So that managers can better respond to concerns, please provide the Administrator's office with the date, time and location of any incident you are calling about.
Additionally, contact information for the Parks Department is at:
http://www.nycgovparks.org/contact_us/html/contact.htmlFor Prospect Park visit:
http://www.prospectpark.org/general/main.cfm?target=contactsBest,
Eugene Patron
Pity we have to watch out for this kind of thing. But let me be clear here. To any members of the Child Evanglism Fellowship or any other evangelical organization of any religion: keep the hell away from my kids unless you ask me first.
UPDATE: I talked with the CEF by email and this is their reply:
I have consulted with our Director in the NYC metropolitan area. He has informed me that CEF has done no work of any kind in the parks since last summer. He also told me that CEF will not be doing any work in any of the parks in Brooklyn this year. When our organization does do this work we train our workers to abide by carefully drafted policies and supervise them to see that the policies are followed. We have purposefully drafted very strong policies for the protection of children whom we serve because we are committed to doing our work with excellence and in compliance with all laws.
We are aware of other children’s ministry groups who are working in the parks of Brooklyn. It is my understanding that the workers who were seen last year, operating in what evidently would have been violation of our policies and procedures, were from another ministry as well. We are not planning to do any work in the parks in Brooklyn this summer. I trust that there will be others who will be able to teach children there about the love of God and how they can know Him.
Thank you for bringing this to our attention.
Marshall J. Pennell, Executive Vice President
Sin
The worst sin is hypocrisy.
The second worst sin is proselytism. How dare someone arrogate to him or herself the right to judge whether my religious views, beliefs and practices are good enough? (Put another way -- my religion is none of your damned business!)
Sorry -- you touched a nerve. Keep up the good work.
Mostly Agree
Can there anything more disgusting than playground stalkers targetting children, whatever their agenda? Anyone who solicits my kid is likely to get a punch in the face; and that's if my wife catches 'em. Me? They'd be lucky if I didn't attempt to trump their First Amendment rights with the Second Aemendment one's I recenly acquired thanks to the Roberts Court (that was a joke).
At least Chabad waits until the kids are over 13.
Nonetheless, my agreement with you has some limits, which I suspect you may embrace as well.
Playgrounds definately fall into an area where permits should be required (and quite possibly never granted) for anyone to pass out lit or hondle passers-by. Other areas (e.g., bike paths), also have safety concerns, which may trump free speech if enforced in a content neutral manner.
But I have real First Amendment concerns about applications which are too broad. The 9th Street entrance to the park should be (and is, whether de facto or de jure) open to everyone to hand out whatever materials they please on concert nights, permit or not. Parks are one of the few real public squares we have left in our City. We should not be so quick to restrict access to such places for speech. In fact, we should be demanding access to such places for speech. And, that means for the annoying (as well as the enlightening), including flag burners and snake handlers.
Further, as much as it nauseates me, prostelytizing is doubly protected, as both free speech and free exercise of religion.
However, I think content neutral rules concerning children and the places they frequent does pass constitutuional muster.
Agreed
That is why I put in my editorial comment about the permits. The permit system HAS been misused by the Bloomberg administration to limit the expression of dissent. In almost every context I am for letting people hand things out, speak out, etc. Freedom of expression is critical. And it is rare that I place limits on it in public places. But there are three issues here:
1. separation of church and state: Perhaps a weak arguement in the case of individuals proselytizing on publicly funded space, but consider the use in some places of school facilities for bible study. In both cases a private organization is using public space. Often at least in the case of bible study they may be paying a fee for the use of the facilities. These people aren't. Both cases are gray areas where freedom of expression and freedom of religion on one person's part clashes with the separation of church and state and the freedom of religion of the families (by proselytizing the children without parental permission these people are stepping on our right to free practice of our religion). The hardest lines to draw are the places where constitutional rights of two people conflict.
2. safety: playgrounds, like schools, are not places where it is safe for adults to approach children without the parents knowing about it. What these people are doing strike me as creepy and cultish. If they stood outside the playground and approached the PARENTS, it would be a whole other thing. But sneaking around the parents' backs to try and recruit children, possibly AGAINST the will of the parents, is just plain perverted.
3. the whole issue of permits: To what degree is the requirement for a permit contrary to freedom of expression? There is no question that having a system of issuing permits automatically puts a limit on freedom of expression. And yet we pretty much all agree that unregulated protests that shut down traffic or a cult recruiting a child against the parents' wishes are pushing the limit of freedom of expression. That is where permits come in...but what is the constitutional justification for them? Another grey area.
I guess there is a fourth area, though it gets back to freedom of religion. This kind of behavior is too often accepted of fundamentalist Christians, but can you imagine if these were fundamentalist Muslims? What if they were Hare Krishnas? Chabad at least has the decency to only talk to fellow Jews, not try to convert non-Jews. But what if a Wahabi group was doing the same thing. We have to accept that if we let fundamentalist Christians recruit children behind our backs we have to let fundamentalist Muslims do the same. Yet in our society, despite Freedom of Religion being a major basis for our laws, the former is defended too often and the latter condemned too often. We can't have a double standard where some religions are more free than others.
Somewhat Agree
1) I don't think a Church-State issue exists in a public park. No one soliciting for their viewpoint in a public park or on a public street bears the imprimitur of the State. Schools are a different kettle of fish, although an argument could be made that if a fee is paid for their usage which relects the cost, plus reasonable profit, then they bear no more of the imprimitur than would the Marriot for hosting a conference for their usual fee. But subsidizing their use would be a definite no-no.
2) safety. Agreed. Children are in a special zone.
3) The necessity of permits must be subject to a standard of reasonableness, and it must be administered in a content neutral manner.
4) All religious groups must be treated equally.
Proselytizing & Freedom of Religion
Freedom of religion also means my freedom from your religion (and vice versa). Proselytizers encroach on that freedom, which is why we need serious curbs on those activities.
That means if some bible-thumper mouths off in the subway, they are violating the law, since the subways are publicly-funded and involve limited freedom of movement.
It also means that if a religious organization applies for a permit to hold a rally in a public park, and they meet the usual requirements that any non-religious organization would be required to meet, they should get the permit. In that case, nobody is forced to attend, or even to pay attention, to the religious rally, so nobody's freedom from religion is impinged upon.
It also means that no religious organization should be allowed to hand out anything to children without their parents' consent. Ever. Under our system, where parents bear sole responsibility for raising children (with some modification for schooling), parents also have sole authority in the area of early regligious indoctrination. Authority and responsibility must be equal and coordinate, or a system does not work.
Hmm
Dan, your subway argument makes a salint point. It is a place from which you can't just get up and walk away.
The quaetion is, would you apply the same rules to beggars, musicians, break dancers, sales people and political pampheteers? If not, it fails constitutional muster.
I'm not sure of the right answer; are you?
But of course
I have gotten a variety of people to stop their illegal activities on the subway, both in train cars and on platforms. I don't care what they're doing, so long as they don't force me to pay attention. If they do, they are wrong.
I have a serious problem with the MTA's "music under the stairs" program, as I feel it is a partial surrender to these intrusions on my peace. I had a problem with the judge's ruling, many years ago, that people could sell the "Street News" paper in the subway system. All of it should not only be outlawed, but the prohibitions should be enforced. I've gone so far as to report police who refused to enforce the law in this type of case.
There are over eight million people crammed into a very tight space. The only way we can maintain our sanity is if we take great care to respect each other's privacy and peace wherever, whenever, and however possible. The alternative is something I'd hate to consider.
Well...
..I'm not sure I agree with that, but it's intellectual consistency is admirable.
I usually enjoy subway performers. And, as part of my five year old son's religious training, he's been taught to always give a quarter to beggars -- but a dollar to musicians (the thing about helping those who help themselves)
Later, he can learn to parse out some distinctions about charity--right now he needs to learned that in Hebrew, the word for charity means "Justice"
And, since we're so intent upon imbuing him with the values we embrace, we're not too keen about others poaching upon our turf without our permission (when he become a teen, this will become his choice). What fucking nerve!
Still, we have to understand that those who attempt to convert others believe they are doing G-d's work, and within sensible and consistent limits (keeping away from my kid at the top of the list) our constitution allows them to do so. And, with all due respect for Mr. Bouldin's wise words, it is not inconsistent for them to say they put a high value on family values, but a higher value upon their crackpot interpretation of what they see as G-d's word.
I embrace tolerance and love my bill of rights, but sometimes following the course where they lead almost makes me want to burn a flag.
America, what a country!
Absolutely right.
Instructing kids in matters of religion is an absolute parental right. The mindset of someone who usurps that right for themselves isn't just startlingly arrogant - because the assumption is that they know better than anyone else on the subject - it's also a direct attack on the entire concept of 'family values' that they otherwise, I'm sure, would profess to hold dear.
CEF is an international
CEF is an international parachurch and they use local fundamentalist churches to access playgrounds--basically like a front for some reason. They do not fess up straightforwardly to being the driving force behind the local activities and missions (they provide the curriculum, the coloring books, toys and other materials that the local churches then use). So I am glad they say they won't be back....but not sure I believe this group.