DALLAS — Two advocacy groups filed a federal lawsuit yesterday against a western Texas school district on behalf of eight parents who say a Bible course violates their religious liberty.

The American Civil Liberties Union and People for the American Way Foundation sued the Ector County Independent School District in U.S. district court, asking the Odessa school system to stop teaching the course. The Ector school board approved the course, a high school elective, by a 4-2 vote in 2005.

"Religion is very important in my family and we are very involved in our religious community. But the public schools are no place for religious indoctrination that promotes certain beliefs that not all the kids in the school share," Doug Hildebrand, an ordained Presbyterian deacon who is among the plaintiffs, said in a written statement released by the ACLU.

School Superintendent Wendell Sollis said district officials were reviewing the lawsuit with their lawyer.

"We are not going to debate the individual points of the suit publicly," he said.

Mike Adkins, spokesman for the Ector Independent School District, has said that the district is comfortable with its curriculum.

The Bible course teaches the King James version of the sacred text using material produced by the Greensboro, N.C.-based National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools. The course uses the Bible as the students' textbook.

The National Council said its curriculum is used in hundreds of school districts, including more than 50 in Texas.

The Ector trustees chose the class over one offered by the Bible Literacy Project, which uses the text The Bible and Its Influence and includes broader discussions of other faiths.

Lisa Graybill, legal director of the ACLU of Texas, said the National Council course is "basically a Sunday School class within the walls of a public school."

Backers include David Barton, who operates a Web site that promotes helping local officials develop policies that reflect biblical views and encourages Christian involvement in civic affairs.

Other supporters include the conservative American Family Association, Eagle Forum and Plano-based Liberty Legal Institute.

"There is no question that these Bible electives are constitutional," said Kelly Shackelford, Liberty Legal's chief counsel. "The United States Supreme Court has stated more than once that teaching about the Bible is not only constitutional, but essential to a quality education. This lawsuit is a loser."

Critics include the Austin-based Texas Freedom Network, a watchdog of the religious right, which claims the coursework contains errors, dubious research and blatantly favors a fundamentalist Protestant Christian view of the Bible.

Kathy Miller, president of the group, said the lawsuit resulted from two years of reckless decisions by Odessa officials. The Texas Freedom Network is not a party to the suit.

"This is a case study in what happens when public officials put their own religious and political agendas ahead of the interests of students and taxpayers," Miller said. "Instead of model courses that respect both the Bible and religious freedom, school board members created a model for promoting their own religious views over everybody else's."