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(JTA) – On Monday, the board of Keller Unbiased College District in Texas launched that night’s prayer chief as “Rabbi Griffin.”
A person sporting a swimsuit and kippah then approached the rostrum and recited the priestly blessing in Hebrew. “Grant us, Adonai, your thoughts tonight so we generally is a blessing to our group, to our kids,” he continued. “Carry ‘Shalom,’ nothing lacking, nothing damaged, to this assembly tonight.”
However this was not an bizarre rabbi, nor an bizarre college board assembly. Keller is the district that, earlier this 12 months, had ordered its libraries to take away all copies of a 2018 graphic novel adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary from cabinets. And “Rabbi Griffin” is Mark Aaron Griffin, a Messianic Jew who final 12 months was charged with a number of counts of sexual assault.
“Final night time we have been shocked however excited once we noticed a person who mentioned he was a rabbi come as much as pray,” Laney Hawes, a mum or dad within the Keller district who recurrently sounds off concerning the board’s insurance policies, instructed the Jewish Telegraphic Company. However, she mentioned, “a fast Google search” revealed Griffin’s true identification.
Griffin, who heads a congregation in close by Saginaw, Texas, that blends Christian beliefs and Jewish practices, is presently awaiting trial on 4 counts of sexual assault. In keeping with experiences of the indictment, he’s accused of utilizing his stature as a “rabbi” to sexually assault a girl in March 2020 after coercing her to change into his “concubine” and citing Abraham and Jacob as examples of religious figures who loved a number of companions. The sufferer claimed she had been assaulted in Griffin’s congregation, together with in his workplace, which DNA samples appeared to corroborate, a warrant mentioned.
First indicted in late 2020, Griffin faces trial subsequent month, native county information point out.
A spokesperson for the varsity district didn’t return a JTA request for remark. The district had ordered the elimination of “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” this summer time, resurrecting a months-old parental problem to the e-book following a brand new college board election. The brand new board then launched an effort to revise its insurance policies round e-book challenges and bans — which have change into a serious rallying cry amongst right-wing mum or dad activists in public faculties.
Keller returned “Anne Frank’s Diary” to circulation per week later following huge public outcry.
Griffin’s congregation, Sar Shalom Synagogue, says its adheres to “Yeshua Centered Judaism,” utilizing a Hebrew identify for Jesus. Mainstream Jewish denominations think about the motion to be Christian and hostile to conventional Jewish beliefs, though Messianic Jews typically promote themselves utilizing Jewish signifiers: On its web site, Sar Shalom (which identifies “Rabbi Aaron” as its founder) claims to have “the very first kosher mikvah [or Jewish ritual bath] constructed for a Jewish group centered on Messiah Yeshua in trendy historical past.”
Keller’s board reportedly started its opening convocation coverage after its most up-to-date members, a number of of whom have been backed by right-wing teams, have been elected in Could. In keeping with Hawes, they’ve by no means invited religious leaders from non-Christian faiths to steer the convocation.
“We then realized why the varsity board was letting [Griffin] pray, as a result of he was praying to Jesus,” Hawes mentioned.
Hawes claimed that after the assembly, she requested two board members if they’d recognized about Griffin’s indictments, and that their response was that he had not but been convicted.
Hawes additionally mentioned she requested the board “why they weren’t permitting members of different faiths and beliefs to take part” within the opening prayer, and mentioned she was instructed that the prayer was meant just for the varsity board trustees, who all consider in Jesus.
Later on the identical assembly, a Jewish pupil at Keller Excessive College spoke out towards what she mentioned have been “relatively offensive and antisemitic feedback” she acquired after sporting a Hanukkah sweater to her college’s Ugly Sweater Day.
“Sadly, these incidents will solely change into extra widespread with minority college students of numerous backgrounds once you actively search their elimination in instructional settings,” the coed, who recognized herself as Allison Perlman, mentioned whereas holding a “Nazis Banned Books” signal, accusing the board of “eradicating all potential books and curricula that don’t align together with your narrow-minded Christian nationalist views.”
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