Religion and school

I will start by saying I am a Christian. I believe in our Constitution and do not believe my rights to practice my faith are more important than someone elses right to practice theirs which is what these two articles come down to debating. Last semester I wrote a paper on intellegent design. I found an article that stated in England science teachers are expected to teach on something like sixteen different theories of how the Earth began. Evolution is taught as the only scientific method. The article proposed that teachers do not teach other theories because they do not understand them and are afraid to delve into the religious and cultural ideas behind the ideas. If we are truely going toward reading across the curriculum, why not assign readings on some of these other theories and teach science/social studies/ reading/ language class at the same time and get a good debate going on the merits of some of these theories. This would satisy most of the persons who want creationism, and intellegent design taught because they are not wanting it taught as fact, but merely heard as a viable theory in most cases.
The two articles being presented are different because in the case of teaching creationism or intellegent design, the school acting as Government is being asked to promote an essentialy religious idea that favors one group. The article on the moment of silence and pledge are concerning an individuals right to free speech. In both cases Government was trying to bend the will of someone and force them to submit against their personal beliefs. The one child's religion forbade members to salute or pledge the flag because it was seen as an idol. Government put the child in a no win situation. Unfortunately we still do this many times with how we word the moment of silence announcement that begins our day at schsool.