It’s the start of second period at Olympus High School in Holladay. While some students are in math or history, one group of students is across the street.
They’re not cutting class. They’re in a building owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for seminary.
A similar scene plays out for roughly 100,000 students at high schools across Utah, according to the church. These students leave during the school day to attend a religious seminary class offered by the church and conducted in a building adjacent to the school, but not on school property.
In areas where there are small populations of the faith, students go to seminary before their school day starts. But in Utah and other states with large LDS populations, like Idaho, students have the option to do what’s called “released-time” seminary in place of one of their elective periods.
“The students are released to their parents, and then the parents decide to allow them to come over here,” explained Nate Burton, the church’s director for seminaries and institutes across the Salt Lake area.
Barton said the goal of seminary is to help youth “deepen conversion to Jesus Christ and His restored gospel.”
One KUER listener wanted to know how this practice is not a violation of the separation of church and state.
The answer comes from a U.S. Supreme Court case that took place more than 70 years ago. But it didn’t have anything to do with Utah or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ seminary program.
The high court settled the constitutionality of released-time religious classes in public education in the 1952 case of Zorach v. Clauson.
The issue at its center was a similar “released-time” policy in New York City schools that allowed kids to leave their public schools during the day to go to religious classes at various faith-based schools. Taxpayers and city residents challenged that policy in court.
Before this, in the 1948 case McCollum v. Board of Education, the court established that religious groups cannot teach religious classes inside public schools.
But in the later Zorach case, the justices ruled in a 6-3 decision that the released-time program in New York was not unconstitutional and did not violate the Establishment Clause of the Constitution.
“You know the old saying: If the mountain doesn't go to Muhammad, Muhammad goes to the mountain,” said Charles Russo, the Joseph Panzer Chair in Education and a research professor in the law school at Dayton University in Ohio.
Released time, he said, works “kind of in reverse. If the kids can't get the religious instruction in the public school, they're allowed to leave the public school to go get it in the faith-based school.”
The court saw the NYC program as accommodating the religious wishes of parents, Russo said, and that the program was OK because it didn’t happen inside of the school. While some people, including Russo, may not believe released-time programs are the best use of a child’s time during the school day, he said the courts have been consistent: these programs do not violate the Constitution.
In the Supreme Court’s majority opinion, Justice William O. Douglas wrote, “We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being. We guarantee the freedom to worship as one chooses.”
Hannah Smith, associate director of the International Center for Law and Religious Studies at Brigham Young University, said the court also wrote that not allowing this kind of program would send a message that the government disfavors religious instruction. The Constitution does not require that the government be hostile towards religion, and the Free Exercise Clause protects a citizen’s right to practice religion.
“By allowing released-time [instruction], the government is not showing partiality to any one group or another,” Smith said, “But they're allowing these religious institutions to sponsor these programs for the benefit of their students, and that does not violate the Establishment Clause.”.
To sum it up, Smith said released-time programs like seminary in Utah do not violate the Constitution for several reasons. The religious instruction takes place off campus. It does not involve the expenditure of the government. It doesn’t involve public school teachers. And it is separate from the school day.
“So I think the contours of the program matter,” Smith said.
Utah is one of several states that have laws surrounding released time. The Utah State Board of Education’s rule is simple. It says a parent can authorize their kid to attend a released-time program, which has to be kept separate from the public school system. A grade won’t be given for the class and a student won’t receive any credit for it. It also says public schools can’t monitor seminary attendance.
The state board’s director of law and professional practices, Benjamin Rasmussen, said schools are allowed to have a place on students’ schedules for released time. When registering for classes, some schools let students select a class labeled “release time (seminary).” Rasmussen said that is not a problem, but it would be a problem if the school identified what religion that release time seminary period is for.
Natalie Mace teaches seminary at the building across from Olympus High School. She is one of 12 teachers in that building, where there are 44 separate classes throughout the day.
Her room looks like a typical classroom, with desks and a whiteboard, but there’s a large picture of Jesus Christ on the wall and quotes from the faith’s leaders.
One Friday in December, students grabbed their scriptures from a closet before taking their seats. The class sang a hymn, then one student said a prayer and another offered a spiritual thought they prepared. Then, Mace dived into her lesson and asked students how they’ve seen Jesus in their lives recently.
Mace told KUER she loves that students in Utah have the option of released-time seminary.
“It's a great opportunity for them to just kind of leave the world a little bit. Like, leave their stresses, leave the things that are stressing them out, and just come and get more of that daily peace and spirit in their lives,” Mace said.
