Often I see well meaning Facebook friends sharing meme's asking for prayer to be returned to our public schools. The first question that pops to mind is, what prayer? Are we speaking of Christian prayer? If so should it a prayer suitable to Protestants, or to Catholics? If it is to be appropriate to protestants which denomination should it most favor or should it be a prayer that all Christians would find acceptable?
As if the Christian question isn't difficult enough we must consider other religions for our country host a diverse mix of all the worlds religions. What prayers should be taught in our public schools? Should it be Christian only or should we also include others such as Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, etc. etc. I have read that there are approximately 4000 different religions in the world today, so which should our government promote?
Thankfully our founding fathers answered all of these question in one simple phrase contained in the first amendment to the constitution of the United States
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"
If someones tells you the founders of our nation established it as a Christian nation they telling you an absolute lie. The first amendment is very clear.
Faith training belongs in the home, in the church, and without government interference as our founding fathers intended.
3 comments:
Coy: You are completely correct, you can't regulate religion through the government.
Thank you! Anyone who thinks that imposing a prayer on schoolchildren will solve anything is engaging in futile wishful thinking. I'm old enough to have been in school when a morning prayer was routine. And I also remember how my classmates and I reacted to the prayer -- twiddling, boredom, looking around the room or out the windows -- and I also remember how some of the kids (who were not traditional Christians) would, or had to, leave the room. Those prayers did nothing to make us better people and actually drove some away from organized religion.
For sure
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