Cite as: 509 U. S. 1 (1993)
Blackmun, J., dissenting
or parents"); Wolman v. Walter, 433 U. S. 229, 250 (1977) (it would "exalt form over substance if this distinction [between equipment loaned to the pupil or his parent and equipment loaned directly to the school] were found to justify a . . . different" result); Ball, 473 U. S., at 395 (rejecting "fiction that a . . . program could be saved by masking it as aid to individual students"). The majority's decision must turn, then, upon the distinction between a teacher and a sign-language interpreter.
"Although Establishment Clause jurisprudence is characterized by few absolutes," at a minimum "the Clause does absolutely prohibit government-financed or government-sponsored indoctrination into the beliefs of a particular religious faith." Id., at 385. See Bowen v. Kendrick, 487 U. S., at 623 (O'Connor, J., concurring) ("[A]ny use of public funds to promote religious doctrines violates the Establishment Clause") (emphasis in original); Meek, 421 U. S., at 371 (" 'The State must be certain, given the Religion Clauses, that subsidized teachers do not inculcate religion,' " quoting Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 619 (1971)); Levitt v. Committee for Public Ed. & Religious Liberty, 413 U. S. 472, 480 (1973) ("[T]he State is constitutionally compelled to assure that the state-supported activity is not being used for religious indoctrination"). In keeping with this restriction, our cases consistently have rejected the provision by government of any resource capable of advancing a school's religious mission. Although the Court generally has permitted the provision of "secular and nonideological services unrelated to the primary, religion-oriented educational function of the sectarian school," Meek, 421 U. S., at 364, it has always proscribed the provision of benefits that afford even the "opportunity for the transmission of sectarian views," Wolman, 433 U. S., at 244.
Thus, the Court has upheld the use of public school buses to transport children to and from school, Everson v. Board of Ed. of Ewing, 330 U. S. 1 (1947), while striking down the
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