The "I Could Have Been A Minister!" Story

The headline in the morning paper read..."School district bans Good Book."  Seems that the Bible is being treated like a bad book in Utah after a parent frustrated by efforts to ban materials from schools convinced a suburban district that some Bible verses were to vulgar or violent for younger children.  And, the Book of Mormon could be next.  The 72,000 student Davis School District north of Salt Lake City recently removed the Bible from some of its schools.  The decision comes as conservative parent activists descend upon school boards in many parts of the United States.  How many of you remember being in high school and having  to read the Bible before you started classes in the morning.  I can remember!  When I was a senior my beautiful female homeroom teacher assigned every student in her homeroom a specific day on which they would read the Bible during homeroom and before classes began.  If you could get someone else to read it for you, that was OK with her.  Well, I didn't mind reading the Bible during homeroom, but I did so with a few conditions.  I would get to pick which Bible verses I would read and I would name my price.  Surprisingly, I read the Bible a few times every week throughout the year.  I charged a specific price for every word that was in the verse and I had a minimum amount of words I would read.  I can tell you that by the end of the year I had quite a few verses memorized after reading them so many times a week and I had quite a few lunches paid for by the end of the year.  Our school year was 180 days in length and I'll bet I read the Bible at least 80 days that year.   I read parts of the 23rd Psalm many times that year.  At first it was like a joke, but by the end of the year, most everyone in my homeroom had the 23rd Psalm memorized.  I think that those who read the Bible themselves at the start of the day did so since they got tired of the same verse being read everyday.  Plus, they didn't want to pay for my lunch every day.  A special note to my homeroom teacher, Miss Nolan...Thanks for helping me pay for my lunch on many days during my Senior year at good ole Manheim Township High School.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.