12-year-old Loyal Grandstaff loves his Bible. So you can imagine how miffed he felt when his teacher at Bueker Middle School in Marshall, Missouri told him he wasn’t allowed to read it in school:

Loyal says he loves reading his Bible and decided to bring it to school before the Christmas break so he could read it during his free time. But the seventh grader said his teacher told him it wasn’t allowed. “I like to read my Bible because it’s a good book,” Loyal said. He said he wasn’t reading out loud and said he wasn’t sharing the Bible with his classmates.

That’s… pretty messed up. I mean, I’m on the kid’s side. Who wouldn’t be?

How did Principal Lance Tobin respond to all this? A few days after Monica Evans reported the story for FOX 4 — Kansas City, he finally had a chance to investigate the story and his conclusion was… surprising to say the least:

[Tobin] told TheBlaze on Friday that claims made by Loyal Grandstaff, a 7th grader at the school, had not been substantiated when a local outlet published them and that the situation has since been resolved. “We just all agreed and we talked about school and religion,” Tobin said. “And I wanted to make sure that they were comfortable understanding that their child could have the Bible at school and could read the Bible at school.” Tobin, who declined to go into specific detail when asked why the family alleged that a teacher had banned the 12 year old from reading the book if that story wasn’t accurate, said that going public with the claims was likely “something that [the family] felt like they needed to do at the time.” When asked how the teacher accused of banning the Bible is faring in light of the attention the situation has been given, the principal added, “There is no teacher involved whatsoever.”

… the hell?

I appreciate how Tobin isn’t throwing the family (or student) under the bus for what appears to be a fabricated story, but make no mistake, that’s all this is.

It was a ridiculous one to begin with, too. I mean, when it comes to accusations you shouldn’t believe, “Christians are persecuted in America” falls just under “Sarah Palin said something intelligent.”

The blame for this becoming a pseudo-controversy falls on Justin Grandstaff, the father in this story, who spoke with Evans on Monday:

Justin says he hasn’t been able to talk to the teacher in question or the principal because of the Christmas break, but he plans to talk to them when school reopens on Tuesday.

In other words, he didn’t bother talking to them about this issue because the school was on break… but he felt perfectly fine accusing them of wrong-doing and publicly shaming them without hearing all the facts.

Watch out, Todd Starnes. You have competition in the bullshit department.

(via Right Wing Watch. Image via Shutterstock)



