Teacher says she thought student’s Ash Wednesday cross was ‘dirt´ and apologizes for making him wash it off
Fox News,
by
Katherine Lam
Original Article
Posted By: ladydawgfan,
3/12/2019 1:37:22 PM
A Utah teacher who forced her student to wash off the Ash Wednesday cross last week said she thought the Catholic marking was “dirt on his forehead” and claimed she didn’t know it was a religious symbol. Moana Patterson, a fourth-grade teacher at Valley View Elementary in Bountiful, apologized Monday for the incident last week, and explained why she had her student, 9-year-old William McLeod, wipe the ashes off his forehead, FOX13 reported. Patterson was placed on administrative leave as Davis School District officials investigate the incident.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
agrunt 3/12/2019 1:41:26 PM (No. 2293)
You lie lady.
62 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
Clinger 3/12/2019 1:44:52 PM (No. 2305)
She wishes that one of two possible truths be true. Either she was ignorant regarding Ash Wednesday despite her rather seasoned career stage or she defied the students religious rights. I have a hard time believing this was her first Ash Wednesday.
Either way she has no business teaching.
49 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
JunkYardDog 3/12/2019 1:46:58 PM (No. 2280)
I don´t buy her "I´ve been living under a rock" defense. She knew exactly what it was.
33 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
rochow 3/12/2019 1:47:23 PM (No. 2288)
Fire her at once! A stupid dame like this has no business teaching anyone, anywhere.
29 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
mean Gene 3/12/2019 1:50:21 PM (No. 2299)
Mormon "superiority" rules in Utah.
Non-Mormons are treated like children.
I get carded buying beer at the supermarket altho I´m in my 70´s!
Propositions pass by the voters are routinely overturned by the Mormon legislature.
Like the passed prop to allow medicinal pot.
This teacher just thought there´d ben no pushback when she pushed an infidel around in class.
I´m glad there was.
26 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
Nimby 3/12/2019 2:00:48 PM (No. 2278)
How old is this atheist ? If she is this illiterate, she has no business teaching
26 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
David Key 3/12/2019 2:02:55 PM (No. 2300)
What we have here is a failure to communicate, or somebody is lying. I vote the latter. Kid says she was told the significance, she says she wasn´t I vote for the kid, cause as the left has told us "kids don´t lie" at least when it came to outlandish accusations about sexual abuse, and this isn´t at all outlandish based on the past performance of teachers and school administrators toward Christian behavior in school.
30 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Heraclitus 3/12/2019 2:05:28 PM (No. 2306)
Saw the child on Fox & Friends this morning. He told this bigot that the Ash Wednesday mark was a religious symbol (in so many words) and she made him stand in the corner and wash it off with a hand wipe.
She --it seems obvious-- WANTED to humiliate this young boy. Her little "mea culpa" was one of the phoneyist exhibitions i´ve ever seen.
Or, this is my observation.
The Left is beginning to be called out; more parents are stepping forward; more young adults are summoning the courage to resist the loud-mouth advocates of leftwing propaganda.
35 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
HotRod 3/12/2019 2:05:34 PM (No. 2284)
I think she is lying, but if she speaks the truth it´s a sad commentary on the ignorance and uneducated condition of teachers these days!
22 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
DVC 3/12/2019 2:07:45 PM (No. 2292)
I have far less trouble believing that she is just a hater of Christians looking for an excuse, than to believe ANYONE can be this ignorant.
Not credible.
27 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
vesparado1 3/12/2019 2:08:52 PM (No. 2285)
Once left our church on Ash Wednesday to find a TV truck and interviewer waiting outside to ask parishioners if the Catholics were gathering because the Pope was sick or something.
Was happy to explain to the ignoramus that we were gathering because the Pope was announcing a new Inquisition ...
29 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
jeffkinnh 3/12/2019 2:10:35 PM (No. 2287)
This was a teacher thinking she could push a child around, telling him it wasn´t appropriate having an Ash Wednesday cross.
Now she "explains" through stupidity. I think she is lying. I have had teachers blatantly lie to me when they thought they might get in trouble. They think because they are in charge of children that they can bamboozle the parents. Further, the administration will back them up because THEY don´t want to get in trouble either. It takes legal threats to get things straightened out. Then they know the games are over.
Something should happen to the teacher. Community service working in a Catholic church to learn a bit? If her record is otherwise good, probably not firing.
Part of the problem is that schools are little fiefdoms and think they are independent from the community who are their customers. Real customers would have far more power and a choice of educational services instead of being locked into unsatisfactory public education.
19 people like this.
Bull Schiff
14 people like this.
Did she ever have a Hindu wash that dirt (red dot) off their foreheads?
21 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
straitpath 3/12/2019 2:17:24 PM (No. 2298)
I am a Mormon raised in Utah. I grew up with the Bible and attended college etc but had never heard of “Ash Wednesday “ until a couple of years ago. I know the path Jesus trod very well, but that particular term? Nah. It depends on your culture, folks. The teacher should have listened and investigated perhaps, but she is not lying.
15 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
Rather Read 3/12/2019 2:28:31 PM (No. 2294)
I wore my ashes all day on Ash Wednesday. I want to believe the teacher but I wonder...with the internet right there, why didn´t she take a minute to look up what the boy told her and not make him wash off the ashes right away? That would at least be courteous.
15 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
felixcat 3/12/2019 2:29:06 PM (No. 2304)
If it was a Muslim symbol, she would never have even thought of challenging him.
29 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
excalgalcg 3/12/2019 2:30:45 PM (No. 2289)
First of all, she humiliated a little boy in front of his peers. That is so against all teaching standards. Then she didn’t believe his explanation but made him wash the ashes off in front of his classmates. She must be dismissed for her behavior and I don’t care that she was so stupid enough to not recognize the symbol of a cross on his forehead. As a retired educator/administrator she needs to be shown the door now.
28 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
udanja99 3/12/2019 2:34:17 PM (No. 2290)
The only person who ever mistook my ashes for dirt was a supermarket checkout clerk. Many of them are not the brightest bulbs in the box.
That said, I don’t for a minute believe the teacher. And even if she was just ignorant, she should have investigated it before taking any action. I’m sure that she had a cell phone with a search engine. How hard would it be to look up the date of Ash Wednesday this year and then look up the way that Catholics recognize the day?
17 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
Namma 3/12/2019 2:34:58 PM (No. 2302)
She is a very dumb teacher. And a terrible liar.
19 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
cartcart 3/12/2019 2:41:16 PM (No. 2281)
The article does not say what religion the teacher is. If she is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, there is a disconnect between her actions and the church teachings. Most LDS would gladly park cars for another church group that had a large gathering or they would encourage a young person for living his or her own faith. This teacher is either culturally illiterate or just plain foolish.
12 people like this.
Reply 22 - Posted by:
lakerman1 3/12/2019 2:42:12 PM (No. 2297)
#14, that red dot on Indian women´s foreheads is not a religious symbol, but instead a beauty mark, they believe.
10 people like this.
Reply 23 - Posted by:
Texas Tillie 3/12/2019 2:43:52 PM (No. 2286)
#15, I have always defended the Mormons as not being a cult, but if what you say is true, I might have to rethink. How can anyone in the 21st century be either that dumb or that brainwashed?
20 people like this.
Reply 24 - Posted by:
Sandbar 3/12/2019 2:56:37 PM (No. 2295)
She is very likely lying but it is not her responsibility to study other´s religions. Having grown up in a small protestant town, I did once tell a co-worker that he had dirt on his forehead. My comment was totally innocent. I had heard the term Ash Wednesday but knew nothing of the custom of wearing ash. That was 50 yr.s ago and I still don´t know the reason.
9 people like this.
Reply 25 - Posted by:
Zumkopf 3/12/2019 3:13:43 PM (No. 2307)
Two possibilities: teacher’s excuse is a lie, or it is true. Judge for yourself which is worse.
12 people like this.
Reply 26 - Posted by:
emmajustin 3/16/2019 6:41:33 AM (No. 2309)
I think she is lying.
But even if she is not lying, she has no business insisting he wash off dirt from his forehead.
20 people like this.
Reply 27 - Posted by:
jeffkinnh 3/16/2019 7:16:05 AM (No. 2301)
"That’s not appropriate in this school"
This strongly implies that she KNEW what it was and didn´t like it.
If it was just "dirt" would it be described as "not appropriate"? The teacher would be so purposeful about a dirty forehead?
Beyond that, the child was obviously upset over being made to repeatedly clean his forehead. The teachers actions were bullying, something on the big no no list that teachers should be WELL aware of.
27 people like this.
Reply 28 - Posted by:
jj1319 3/16/2019 8:19:07 AM (No. 2296)
Next you´ll be telling me she´s not a hero.
13 people like this.
Reply 29 - Posted by:
beca 3/16/2019 10:14:43 AM (No. 2279)
The teacher lied. She knew what it was ... he told her. And she was nasty about it. .,
14 people like this.
Reply 30 - Posted by:
radrelic 3/16/2019 2:09:30 PM (No. 2291)
Re # 15 and others ready to blame the Mormons, you may be glad to know that the atheists blame the Mormoins as the most offensively Christian or religious.
]How can people expect a teacher to know about Ash Wednesday and still find being ignorant of what the LDS people/culture really is about. And how can Americans-fair minded Americans dump on a group for the actions of one ignorant person.
You can probably count on the Council of Churches in Utah to talk with school powers so this doesn´t happen again? That is the beauty of Utah-fixing the problems at the core instate?
17 people like this.
Reply 31 - Posted by:
jlw509 3/16/2019 8:15:29 PM (No. 2283)
Do ya suppose she needs a refreshed course in cultural literacy?
8 people like this.
Reply 32 - Posted by:
MickTurn 3/16/2019 9:07:55 PM (No. 2282)
BS...she is now lying about it to CYA!
8 people like this.
Reply 33 - Posted by:
beca 3/20/2019 9:25:36 AM (No. 2303)
Liar!!!
5 people like this.
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I walked into school many times with ashes on my forehead and never had a problem. Of course, that was in the 70´s and 80´s. But even if she didn´t know what it was, the student told her repeatedly and she STILL made him wipe it off!!