HARRISBURG - Kindergartner Wesley Busch looked forward to the day when his mother would visit his suburban Philadelphia elementary school and read aloud from his favorite book - the Bible.

But Donna Busch said she was denied the opportunity after a principal who appeared agitated said Wesley's cherished book wasn't welcome in a public school classroom. She said the incident led her 6-year-old son to conclude that reading the Bible is bad.

With the help of the Rutherford Institute, a Christian-oriented civil liberties group based in Charlottesville, Va., Busch filed a federal lawsuit on May 3 accusing the Marple Newtown School District of infringing on her right to express her religious beliefs and discriminating against Christianity.

"What Wesley has learned in all of this is that the Bible is bad in school, and they don't like it. I think he's unsure of his footing ... It's so much a part of him and our life," said Busch, who attends a Baptist church but doesn't identify with a specific Christian denomination.

Wesley's teacher had invited Busch to her classroom at Culbertson Elementary School on Oct. 18 as part of a ritual called "Me Week," in which the class would learn more about a featured student, according to the complaint. One of the activities involves the student's parent reading from a favorite book in class.

But before the teacher would let Busch continue, she said she would have to get permission from the principal. In a meeting in the hallway outside the open door of Wesley's classroom, Principal Thomas Cook informed Busch that she couldn't read the Bible in class, the suit said.

"He was agitated and upset about it, and felt I should know that, according to him, it was against the law," Busch said.

Busch's complaint alleges that the Bible-reading ban is part of a pattern of discrimination against Christians. Students were allowed to read a book about Judaism, learn about the dreidel game, and make Hanukkah decorations - but were prohibited from making Christmas decorations, the suit said.

School board president Edward Partridge declined comment on the lawsuit Tuesday, but said the board was investigating the incident.

A similar incident in Medford, N.J., spawned litigation in which the courts sided with a public school teacher who banned a first-grader from reading his classmates a story from "The Beginner's Bible" in 1996.

In that case, a federal judge and the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that the teacher was within her rights to restrict access to what the school calls a "captive audience" of 6- and 7-year-olds. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case in 2001.

But Ted Hoppe, a Media lawyer representing Busch, alleged that one key difference in his client's case is that Wesley's school seems to look more favorably upon Judaism than Christianity.

"We want to get an understanding with the school and the school district that Culbertson will be an environment that's not hostile to Christian beliefs and practices," Hoppe said.