Final Blog Post

            After reading the preamble we were assigned as a reading, I started to compare the laws we had read over time to it.  Hammurabi’s code was the first set of laws we looked at this unit and I’ve come to realize the evolution that has happened from then.  Hammurabi’s code is very descriptive towards certain laws and happens to have very violent punishments for each of the broken laws.  A theme that pops out between the comparisons is the idea of slavery.  In Hammurabi’s code, slavery is mentioned as a normal idea in about 45 of the laws recorded.  In the preamble, Article 4 strictly states, “No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.”  To continue on that, the 5^th article of the preamble states that, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.,” which also beats the violent punishment ideals in Hammurabi’s code.  Then to move on to a more recent set of laws we discussed or The Division of things (Law of things) we find a more modern set of laws that are closer to the preamble.  One thing that’s different between the two is that the Division of things goes into a lot more detail on its laws.  It also touches on environmental factors of property, like in law number 12, “Wild beasts, birds, fish and all animals, which live either in the sea, the air, or the earth, so soon as they are taken by anyone, immediately become by the law of nations the property of the captor...” In the preamble, it doesn’t talk about the ownership of environmental components, which could mean that either they didn’t think it was important or that they assumed it was moral.  Over this unit I’ve really come to understand the structure of human laws.  I really like this unit, and what activities we went through to strengthen our knowledge on it.  This was a great way to end the unit and I believe students of future years should focus on the same.

Class Rights Reflection (women/men)

Today during class we had a discussion on two separate documents given to us.  One of the documents was written in 1789 and talked about the rights a man who is considered a citizen has.  Now the problem with this first set of laws was the ability that people have to use those laws and interoperate them differently.  They were soon thought as rights only for men and not for women.  The other document came in after the other document (two years), to express how women have the same rights as the men do. I thought that the author of the women's rights set of laws really expressed how women felt neglected to this set, and how they not only deserved the same rights, but receive the same punishments.  I thought that this discussion after reading the two readings was showing how easy it is to interoperate texts.  Just because the authors wrote all men on the laws some people took that as just men.  Another example i could think of like this situation is the idea of homophobia is against god and that is supposedly spoken of inside of the bible.  Half the people value that because the text says it, it must be true, while the others say that the text cannot always be true.  That is how that connection of people trying to go against the written law is started.  The readings were a little broad and didn't explain to their best abilities what they meant in the long run, but they showed off the idea of perspective of different people on texts.

Magna Carta

In class on Monday, we were split up into groups and were sent two different readings.  My reading was about Magna Carta.  Magna Carta is the concept that all people in and not in the government of a nation must abide and follow by the same rules.  Magna Carta was not like a strictly built concept or set of laws, but more of a set of principles known.  The Magna Carta speaks about the power certain people have under certain circumstances.  For example, one of them is that the king has authority in situations of violence and leadership, but isn’t given any excuses to break the rules.  It also states that the Archbishop has the rights to act on anything without interference from the king.  Something that stuck out to me in the Magna Carta summaries was that one of their principles states that there should be a place where courts could always take place and have places to store legal records and information to refer to.  This was suprising to me because It was suggesting that there hadn’t been a court house before.  The idea of doing courts on numerous of different areas just didn’t seem logical to me.   Overall, in the Magna Carta I believed in the ideas of fair hearing and treatment to all people.  When we discussed the Magna Carta, classmates had the same reaction as I did.  Do I think that it is a good functioning set of principles?  Technically I do because it preaches the idea of moral treatment to people and how everyone as a equal right to trials.  One of the problems with it is dated and would need updating.  It is also a little broad from what I read.  I never had really known what Magna Carta was until this activity and it gives off a good sense of what human laws should be.    

Post on theme thinking process

For the final this year, my thoughts have been bouncing between the themes of communication or industrialization.  In the process of deciding, many of the big events I chose fit under both themes.  For example, Oil production, a communication between countries for economy, peace, and war.  But the Oil production is also a industry, so it falls under industrialization.  Over the course of the year both of the themes flashed up under the events we were learning about.  When we were learning about government and human rights, many instances of managing the working people of communities.  In environmental and religion, it showcases the need for expansion and travel of word spread for advancement.  In the end, I decided that choosing industrialization would be a better theme.  I decided this because it chooses a path that has many more interpretation in the learning process.   

Group discussion on laws islam

today in the group discussion i thought our class did a decent job on having a group discussion on laws of islam.  Compared to the that was had on the illinois laws, less people talked.  I think the reason why this happened is because the answered questions of the text were pretty much expressing the same thing everytime.  The conversation started out slow, mostly with statements about how the text was very flexible.  When i say flexible i mean in the sense that the laws can be flipped and divided up based on different regions, countries, or cities' beliefs on their own form of islam.  The discussion started to turn into theories on how religion can effect a community.  The group talked about how in most religions, you can choose which parts of the religion you wish to follow.  For example, many followers of Judaism believe in keeping kosher.  But in a lot of cases, people who believe in judaism choose not to.  The question that came up was how does religion effect law?  In my opinion, they are two separate things.  Law is something that depicts and enforces a community that you choose to live in to follow rules set by leaders.  In religion, it is completely belief and you can choose which parts you believe in and which you wish to leave behind.

Twelve Tables

During Friday’s class we were given a list of human rights named the Twelve Tables.  The Twelve Tables were formed at the foundation of Ancient Roman Law.  They used the laws to enforce peace and justice within their cities.   Most of the laws set in are used to create a image of a perfect moral citizen.  Usually though, the laws would fall in favor of a wealthy male, leaving behind women, children, and ones who live in poverty below.   I thought the Twelve Tables, even though they helped form modern law today, were not very helpful.  A lot of the laws stated have circumstances that can be false.  Also, it displays that the government should know more about your personal life within your family.  

Socrates

Socrates believed that all knowledge is not knowing anything.  Being a philosopher, he traveled around Athens asking multiple questions to the smartest people others could recommend.  Always after about 10 minutes of asking questions, the "smart" person he was sent to would either contradict themselves or loose the answer.  This made the "smart" people angry and usually those smart people had themselves some power.  It ended with Socrates being charged with corruption of youth and being arrested and sentenced to death.  Before he was sent to be executed, one of his followers attempted to get Socrates to escape.  Socrates declined because he stated that he didn't want to be above law and was killed.   In class today, we were grouped off to discuss whether Socrates had better reasons to stay within the prison and let law rule out or to escape.  The answer was to be decided between four topics.  Human Rights, Justice, Fairness, and Respect for the Law.  

Human Rights:  

We decided based on the theme of Human Rights, Socrates should have escaped the prison because putting a human to death as a punishment goes against the basic idea of Human Rights.

Fairness:

Under the topic of fairness, we decided that Socrates would have seen it unfair to be able to escape a punishment that had so many other victims for false conceptions like he experienced.

Justice:

Justice was not completely thought of in this situation because Socrates was accused of something that was a misconception.  Because of this, in the theme of Justice Socrates should have escaped.

Respect for the Law: 

Socrates stated to his follower that he did not want to be above the Law because the Law had provided so many benefits for the society.  He had no interest in corrupting that so staying was the right choice.

Out of the four themes, half fall towards him to should have left while the other half leans towards proving why he should stay.  I think it was a very true and courageous thing to stay and i'm sure after the commitment, the accusers of him thought twice of what they did.  

Pre-Law and Human Rights

This and last week we started our next unit on law and human rights.  We watched Cry Freedom, a movie about the apartheid in south africa and a south african editor attempting to publish a book about a locally famous activist against apartheid, Steve Biko.  This movie was a interesting way to start off the unit because I hadn't ever known about the apartheid and how long it had happened.  After finishing the movie and participating in some in class discussions, questions started coming into my head.  What do human rights mean to me?  How does it effect me, and the people like me?  When I first thought about the effect human rights has, I underestimated it.  Human rights does play a huge role in society today and for future generations.  But in my idea for Human rights and law to work it either can exist and thrive or not exist at all.  Thats a contradicting statement, but I think it is true.  Human rights can be put into play, setting examples for everyone to live a ideal fairness, or it can just not exist and the separation that battles with human rights today wouldn't exist.  I believe the issues with human rights start when its half way in between existing and not existing.  For example, if men all get the right to vote, but women don't, that in half way because not every human has a free right.  Human rights should be rights given to every human no matter who they are.  Why should it be called Human rights if not every human can get them?  If that isn't achieved or possible, then there shouldn't be and Human rights at all and people should be free to do anything they want because then they would be equal.

The Code of Hammurabi

Today in class we had a discussion about The Code of Hammurabi.  The major points we talked about during the discussion were why was it made, was it a effective idea, and how does the code connect to modern day human right laws.  Before the Hammurabi Code, fugitives if caught would be brought to justice and not usually get a fair trial.  Crime rates were higher up because punishments weren't known to the actions being done.  The reason why it was created was to have not only a more organized punishment system, but also to create a fear to the Babylonian civilization in order to seize power and peace.  It was an effective idea because not only did they list punishments, but insurance that if something happened to an innocent moral person, the government/power would provide them with benefits.  So not only did it show people that doing something bad like killing someone, stealing, or lying would get you in serious trouble (usually death) and staying true and moral would get you benefits when in your time of need.  The code that really interested me was #24, where it states, "If a life was lost, the city and governor shall pay one mina of silver to his people."  In modern times the silver mina would equal $110.10 in US dollars.  Its interesting that for every death, the family would get 100 dollars for the loss and it creates a connection between the everyday people and the city and governor.  One of my only main flaws with the code is that it doesn't list any codes if someone within the government or power does wrong, which makes the social class fall in favor for the high class.  I think that this is not like modern human rights laws because Hammurabi's code is too in detail in most of the codes.  Also, modern day rights label every single social class, race, and gender as having the same rights.  I think that overall Hammurabi's code would cause a rebellion especially in modern times 

Apartheid Research

Before starting Cry Freedom, I didn't know too much about the Apartheid system.  I honestly didn't know too much about South Africa besides that it was colonized by the British.  Deciding to prompt myself with some information, I began my research on the Apartheid system.  Apartheid was a racial segregation system constructed by the the South American Government.  It was developed after World War II in 1948, and was abolished in 1994.  All non-white government representers were kicked out, and not long after that all non-white citizens were stripped of their citizens.  Because they no longer were allowed to be citizens in the cities, they were sent to live in tribally based homelands that were self-governed.  Schools, work places, public services, and even benches became segregated and all inferior to those of white people.    Because of this segregation, the country was split up into multiple states based on the Apartheid system that was being enforced.  The acts of the Apartheid system sounds very alike to the Jim Crow laws.  What is stunning to me is to look upon the Jim Crow laws and know it happened a long time ago and that racial injustice is not more but then to realize that something just like it ended  only three years before I was born. I'm truly interested in this topic and discovering more reasons that it could have connected with Jim Crow.

Pre Conceived thoughts on Final

For this unit's final we were put into small groups to first research a question based on significance in history, and then soon to be put into a larger group to discuss and decided and number the most important views.  My topic is "Religion is a vehicle for cultural diffusion."  My pre conceived thoughts on this topic is that it is one of the most important factors in history not only religion, but advancement and society in general.  The fusion and interference of different people from different beliefs led to evolution.  Also, because of the fusion of different people, beliefs and religions were created being based off of the other opinions and beliefs.  Religions, like Buddhism, took morals and ideal thoughts from other religions, like hinduism, to create a foundation for theirs.
For two different cultures in different places, having the same beliefs brought them together to form their own diffusion.  If different religions between people draw people apart, that means people with the same become closer together.  This topic is the most important in my opinion because it states the path the humans and society developed from.

Agents of the Powerless

In history, there have been many powerful leaders that can be catrgorized into two main groups, Agents of the powerful and Agents of the powerless.   Agents of the powerless have a bigger impact then ones of power because they are remembered as moral people, connected to a greater good, and have peaceful intentions. 

Morals are usually thought as one of the most important things to have inside and outside a society.  Without morals, people would have no intention to do good or withhold themselves from doing wrong.   It is inhumane of a leader to preach their followers to do something that breaks human ideals.  In my opinion, being moral is big part of being a good leader, and it usually not seen in leaders of the powerful because of their want for power. 

Most Agents of the powerless has a deeper connection to a religion, society, or group of people.  Background and views is very important thing to have while being a leader of peaceful intentions.  Having more exposure to the world opens your eyes to different feelings of people.   Leaders that came from being poor, or from being rich, or from being harassed, or from harassing think in someone else’s shoes.  That is why they become popular to the people like them.  They are usually like the underdogs.

Through both these points comes the point of having peaceful intentions.  Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and the Dalai Lama have all preached for a peaceful society, no matter where in the world they are.  I think the Agents of the Powerless are more impacting and stronger because they are remembered for longer times.  Even though the Powerful obtain more power, the other half of people that they didn’t satisfy will seek a new leader to go against them.  There then becomes a constant theme of taking each other over and moving in circles.  That is why the Agents of the Powerless leave a better impact in the long run.

Christian to Buddhist Missionaries

Missionaries are followers of a belief that are sent to inform others who do not share those beliefs ways of life, education, social justice, etc.  The ideal missionary is Christian, but it is used to example the ideology.  Christian missionaries believed that if they couldn’t convert those who weren’t Christian, it would be a life penalty.  Because of this lust and commitment to convert, missionaries then became a tool for political and religious powers.  In these cases, religion was used as a tool to spread and gain power.  Christian missionaries were said to be spreaders of religion, but how could they maintain that title if they were completely backed up and supported by their governments?  

Not too far away from the growing violent missionaries, Buddhist missionaries had a very different approach.  Buddhist missionaries believed in more peaceful and easier journeys to inform the different believers.  Buddhists believed that their mission was to enlighten the people, and not to “save” them from themselves for believing in something that was said to be wrong.  Buddhist missionaries noted the Christian missionaries bad reputation in Africa and the “convert or die” method.  As they learned from their opponents, they became agents for peace.  In the end, it is a thick line drawn between the peaceful methods and the violent.  As history moved on, the violent methods took religions farther then peaceful methods did on cultures.  This could be because of fear of violence, having a more powerful side, or maybe a human lust for being assertive.  

Reflection on Timeline-Map project

The Timeline-Map project we did last week in class at first seemed to make no sense.  When the idea of this project was presented, my first initial reaction was to figure out a way where all of these religions actually had a way in intertwining.  When we got in our groups, we split up the four topics in our group of three.  I had buddhism, which was always an interest for me because of my past camp consular who was buddhist.  The hardest part about this project wasn't finding a way they all intertwined, I soon discovered.  The hardest part of this project was finding and picking the best important event to be labeled on the timeline-map.  I finally picked the events that corresponded the most with the rising and decreasing events of buddhism.  When we combined our tags to set up our timeline, we discovered a smooth path of events that trailed after each other, braiding the different religions together.  The process of this project was stressful at times, but once you got hold of a idea of a tag you were set.  Putting time and effort into finding the best tags pays off in the end when you present with the other religions no doubt.  I don't think this project should change if done again because it really made us think in a different mind frame.  I would possibly change the amount of class time dedicated to explaining the project, so kids wouldn't be as confused at the start of it.

Issues that would come from modern day taoism and confucianism in america

In class today we made a diagram showing that different ways in which taoism benefits and how confucianism benefits and aspects in common.  A question that was brought up and stuck out to me was how would these beliefs effect modern day America, if they were believed in.  This is what I came up with:

Confucianism in America:
What I assume would happen would be a society where people were pushed very hard to maintain proper quota.  It would be a lot more stricter for various reasons and I do not think it would be a free country like it is today.  The whole idea becoming a good person with helping others would fall apart in some areas at the end.  If the people were restricted too much, there is bound to be a riot or demonstrations against the belief. In which, the leader of the society would inflict violence to contain the excitement, which would ruin the reputation of being generous and helping the community.  How can inflicting pain and asking so much from people help the general community?

Taoism in America:
Taoism is a much easier way to live by and overall wouldn't effect the community negatively as large as confucianism would.  Because of it's ideas not being at strong as powerful and life devoting like a religion would,  I think America would actually gain more freedom rather then loose it.  This could become a issue because of the order that would be lost.  A large part of a strong powerful nation and creating a working system is to have order within the community.  If everyone keeps to themselves what can you do?  So if Taoism could be a factor of one part of your life and the other held order, like confucianism, and believed in working as a society.

Taoism and Confucianism

I have read about these two different viewpoints for a while now but their differences still didn't seem clear to me.  Recently I referred back to previous readings and poked my nose into some new ones to figure out what are the differences between Taoism and Confucianism.  I found out that they disagree on several points on worldly functions and idealistic people within those functions.  

Confucianism                                                                                                                            Taoism

Tends to dislike nature                                      (nature)                                    Taoism finds beauty in nature

actions towards other people                  (Measurement in goodness)             The world should be left alone

providing food, arms, and trust               (Important to rule)                            Enjoy time, basic needs, untouched

No time away from society                   (Gaining Knowledge)                             Understanding oneself

_____

To me Taoism sounds more like Buddhism .  The whole idea of seeing things how they really are and understanding oneself is a larger factor for Buddhism and Taoism.  Confucianism is very strict about their lifestyles within a community.  I think that taoism would be much more beneficial to a society because the idea of being alway in with society for everything is going to drive people to riot.  That has already happened.  I'm glad i finally figured out how to distinguish the two.

Why did Christianity grow and become so popular?

In class today we had a heated (i'd like to think so) argument about two different readings that had different ideas of why christianity grew and became popular.  My reading reasoned that it became popular because of the social ease and acceptance provided to all social classes.  The reading mostly touched on ideas about how the pagans were outcasting and accusing the christians of being atheist, but there were some points you could pull out from the text.  One of the major points being presented in the text was the idea of how christianity was such a open armed religion.  People who were young, not as wealthy, and questioning their beliefs favored it because it provided so many benefits and was a quite simple understanding.  It also was branched off of Judaism so people interested in the were assuming that christianity was the modernized version.  The idea of this religion grew so fast because of the ways in which the disciples enforced the idea of how you could tell your friends, family, neighbors, whoever about this religion and they could participate. The idea of passing through people was the number one way of getting something spread around, just like the black plague idea (except no constant deaths) In the other group it talked more about the idea of the beliefs being strong, like the actual idea of the religion was appealing to people. I think that that was a factor in the spreading of it, but it was not the full deal. Overall I think that people give into beliefs when it offers them so many appealing advantages. Why wouldn't you want to be in something simple and giving feelings of being within something greater.

ICIRR immigrant workshop reflection

blog post:
Today I had a oppuritunity to attend a workshop lecture hosted by Malcon X college.  The theme of the workshop was the issues related to protecting and educating immigrants and refugees. in the morning, it started off with a openning ceremony, in which, Congressman Luis Gutierez, Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, Governor Pat Quinn, Senator Richard Durbin, and House Speaker Michael Madigan spoke at.  They all shared personal stories about how immigration effected them and they invited some people with family experiences to come up and talk with them.  Something they really were pushing on was not just the rights for immigrants, but for them and others to reiceve proper education and opportunities to take them somewhere in their lives.  After the opening ceremony closed, about ten workshops all on different topics opened all around the school.  We were given the chance to go and look at all of the rooms and topics and decide on which we would want to sit in on.  As I visited the different rooms they all had similar themes that were very broad.  I finally came to a room with less people with the topic of Early Childhood development.  This seemed odd, it didn't really seem to tie into the common theme that the workshops were based off of.  I decided to sit in.  What it was discussing was the idea of creating jobs for parents who are immigrants who had not received a good education to go to school with their young kids (jk-4th grade) and become parents mentors in the classes.  The classes were overcrowded, so the mentors would serve as a extra pair of hands in teaching and helpings the kids.  Because of the programs that have started this, these mothers and fathers are soon taking classes and studying to become teachers and then graduating as one.  This program first started in about three schools in  the Logan Sqaure neighborhood.  Classroom reactions were first very unhappy with the idea of having parents sit and help with their classes.  But by the end of the school after the firs year of having the mentors, every classroom was asking for mentors.  I had never heard about this idea and job, and I found it so interesting.  This program has now expanded to seven schools, and soon to eleven.  The most interesting part to me was how they actually had a mentor from one of the schools come up an speak about it.  They also had a kid from one of the 4th grade class speak about having one.  I really appreciate visiting this event and I'm thrilled to have learned about something completely new. 

Reflection on, "Akhenaten"

Before this reading, I had never heard of him.  I had never even known about a spark of monotheism in egyptian history.  In the reading, " The Hymn to Aten," it lists a set of ideals created by Akhenaten.  Basically in everything he lists, he is creating a perfect lifestyle to live by, where you are protected and nothing can go wrong.  Also, in one section of the reading, he speaks about how before the sun god, Aten, was addressed as the only god as oppose to all of the gods, how the human's eyes were covered and they didn't know anything.  So, in a way Akhenaten is sort of trashing polytheism is a classy manner.  Now something that i was interested the we discussed is how when Akhenaten declared there only being one god, how everyone followed his way, then switched back to polytheism after he died.  I think that mostly comes from the way he projected his beliefs.  If he wasn't doing a very good job, they obviously it didn't stick with the people.  To conclude, In my opinion i think of Akhenaten as being a not very persuasive and good pusher of his religious ideas, and that is what made the whole monotheistic idea at the time suffer.

Polytheism/monotheism pros and cons argument

In class, we were recently asked to be split up in different groups and to discuss and bullet point to positive and negative facts of monotheism and polytheism.  On the monotheistic positive side, there was a overall unity of sharing one god to believe in in a community, which polytheism does not have.  On the monotheistic down side, it is a more restricted and more against competing over religions.  For polytheistic positive side, it's a more open religion where you can decide which of the certain gods you wish to pray to. It has a more freedom feel to it.  On the downside, it is not as unified and it runs into the problem of organizing religious leaders for each of the gods and which god possess the most power.  My personal opinion, being a questioning atheist, I think the idea of monotheistic religion is for the better.  It's a more modern aspect of looking at things, and it really has the power of bringing people together.  My issue is what religions cause people to do.  It could be something amazing, or something completely awful.  When i think of religion, I don't think of a superpower trying to gain power over the world.  What my understanding, or what i think, a religion is supposed to be is a much more personal belief and view upon things.  I may be wrong in some peoples opinions, but how can you tell what is the right answer is in religion.  In politics, government, and economy for example, everything comes down to helping the better good of the community.  But religion is much more complex, it dominates the mental aspect of all of those.  I may just be ranting on about something pointless but how can i write on the right and wrong ideas of two different sides of religion where i don't even understand ones values of their belief.  It's complicated.  To conclude, my idea of a more organized religion remains with the belief of monotheism.

Main Themes in the Religion Unit

In class we started debating and discussing the main themes that we thought would go into the religion unit.  The main themes and thoughts brought up were mostly ideas about discrimination and respect issued between religions.  I think that those are the two building blocks to all the other issues.  If a community does not accept someone because of their personal belief, that can lead to all the other issues brought up.  For example terrorism, political discrimination, and government unfairness.  People act upon impulse and they will take to heart what people say about their belief.  Sometimes, action for people is started by their opinion on their beliefs.  Other times their actions are shielded because of other people's beliefs of their beliefs.  It puts you right back where you started.  The foundation of the issues is the lack of respect people will have to other people.  That doesn't seem like a very big issue and that is why no one addresses it.  If people of a certain belief think that everyone should believe in their belief, would that help and prevent any more issues?  Constrictive worldly views need different beliefs to create actual progress in the world.  The main issues that i think that should be brought up the most this semester are effects through government, bordering religion values between tradition and modern ideas, action based from religion, views upon which religions are discriminated, and history relationships between  religions.  The idea of learning where religions are connected interests me.  I think it would be interesting to go into not why the community of people go against religions that are not like their own but learning how religions and political leaders of both sides handle it.  Overall the idea of figuring out what changes views between religions interests me.

Reflection on Star wars movie

In the scenes we watched from star wars, i though the points that were connected to religious factors were very true.  Some people said that there were no religion points made in the movie, but i definitely saw some of those points come to light.  I think the idea of having a evil and a good side isn't too religion related because thats pretty much the plot to every good story.  The symbolism starts to come out when the good side comes out in the story when Luke SkyWalker starts to speak about his beliefs of the force.  Also Darth Vader talks about his beliefs in the force.  The whole idea of having this argument between the idea of science and the idea of belief is a roll found a few times in this movie.  One of the earlier scene shows Darth Vader at a meeting and a member makes a snappy comment about doubting Darth Vader's beliefs.  Another obvious moment is when Han Solo is watching Luke Skywalker practicing with the force, and observes that he thinks Luke is running on pure luck.  The movie is split in half creating two opposing sides in many ways.  One could be one side being evil, and the other being good.  One being believers in the force, the others being believers in science.  While we were discussing these topics in class another scene and addition from another unexpected movie sparked my memory.  In the movie Nacho Libre, with Jack Black, his side kick in the movie believes in science.  Jack Black's role was born to a church.  This concept of science and beliefs comes up a lot in this movie.  Overall, Star Wars was a good choice to create a foundation for our Religion Unit.