What Happens When a School Board of Religious Zealots Will 'Lie for Jesus'?

By Onnesha Roychoudhuri, AlterNet. Posted June 20, 2008.

The intelligent design case in Dover, Penn., was the stuff of tabloid dreams: a community divided when a school board led by religious fundamentalists tried to bring creationism into the local biology curriculum. But look beneath the surface, and it was hardly the two-dimensional "science versus religion" narrative favored by the press. As Lauri Lebo, a local reporter who covered the trial, writes, the "'Darwinism'-spouting teachers were preachers' kids; the 'atheist' plaintiffs taught Sunday school; the 'activist' judge was a Bush-appointed Republican; and the journalists labeled 'liars' were willing to go to jail for the truth."

In her new book, The Devil in Dover: An Insider's Story of Dogma v. Darwin in Small-Town America, Lebo writes of her journey through a familiar town made alien by a handful of school board members willing to, as Lebo puts it, "lie for Jesus." Lebo closely follows the story of how a handful of fundamentalists, pushing to include the teaching of creationism in school biology courses change their tack when the conservative Christian Thomas More Law Center gets involved. School board members suddenly stop talking about Jesus and creationism, denying statements they made to local reporters, and saying instead they were advocating the teaching of the so-called science of intelligent design. The lies were outright enough to make the presiding judge flush with anger, who subsequently cited the school board's "breathtaking inanity," in his decision against them.

While it quickly becomes clear who is lying and who is telling the truth in the trial, Lebo explores the far more complex question of why school board members would choose to lie. The weeks she spent covering the trial, speaking intimately with both school board members and the parents in the community who took them on, are a testament to the earnestness and curiosity with which Lebo sought answers to the deeper questions at hand: What was really at stake for those who lied, and why does such a fundamental divide occur not just within a community, but within families? How can we connect with those who do not believe as we do?

Throughout the coverage of the trial, Lebo's narrative weaves courtroom tensions in with the heated conversations she had with her fundamentalist father. It is at once the story of a historic court battle and the story of how the issues at its heart -- faith, belief and truth -- can deeply affect us all.

Lebo sat down with AlterNet to talk about the many characters she met during the trial and her creationist-inspired road trip that left her with more questions -- and a tattoo of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Onnesha Roychoudhuri: At the start of the book, you say, "This isn't a story about God versus science but one of truth versus lies." That conclusion isn't something you took for granted.

Lauri Lebo: I don't come from a science background. This was about scientific proof of the existence of God, and I admit I wasn't sure if that was possible, but I wanted to look into it. I really did come into this with an open mind, but I wanted know what I was talking about. So I threw myself into understanding, I really started working on learning the issues on both sides. When I talked to the real scientists, I noticed that they were always so great about explaining things to me. If I had a question, or if I didn't get it, they'd say, "Let me try to explain it a different way." One scientist from Kansas actually said, "I have to go visit my in-laws this weekend, but here's their number if you need me." I had never even met him beyond talking on the phone, but they were just so helpful.

I started getting suspicious of the other side, like the Discovery Institute, when I found that they would use really long words that didn't really make much sense to me and when I would say, "I'm not understanding your point," they would use the same long words, only they'd say them faster and louder. They never deviated from the script. I started to get the feeling that they weren't being straight with me. At one point, I know that [senior fellow at the Discovery Institute] Jonathan West said to me, "I don't get it. Other reporters get this. You don't. Why are you so obtuse?"

OR: How did Dover start? You write about how, when the school board approached the science teachers about teaching creationism, one of them even laughed, thinking it was a joke. How did the creationist movement gain momentum?

LL: In the minds of science teachers, the idea that creationism is legitimate science is so absurd that they have trouble understanding how anyone could embrace it. The teacher who laughed was Bryan Rehm, a very devout Christian. Actually, most of the science teachers (in this trial) were very religious, which is interesting. This all started when Alan Bonsell ran for school board office. He was really interested in pushing a religious agenda. This was something that grew out of the Moral Majority of the 1980s. A lot of people started running for school boards so that they could get "God back into the schools," as they say. Bonsell was definitely leading this agenda: I don't think it was an accident that he appointed Jane Cleaver, who got a petition going to bring prayer back into the schools, and Bill Buckingham, the religious retired police officer. When vacancies appeared, Alan Bonsell led efforts to get them on the school board to stack the deck with people who shared his views that God should be taught in science class.

See more stories tagged with: religion, creationism, intelligent design

Onnesha Roychoudhuri is a San Francisco-based writer and editor. She has written for AlterNet, The American Prospect, Salon, MotherJones, Truthdig, In These Times, Huffington Post and Women's eNews.

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