Prayer in School

PRAYER IN SCHOOL For the past few decades the quality of the public school system, especially in the inner city, has gone downhill. The environment that children are growing up in is nothing to be envied and never before has there been so much violence and degradation of moral consciousness among our young people. Ever since the ban on prayer in public schools children are entering adulthood with little to no moral compass to guide them. They definitely have a politically correct compass but is using this as a guide in life better than living by moral standards? I believe the ban on prayer in public school has played a big part in the rise of a generation full of morally inept people. If the ban on prayer in public school were lifted I believe society as a whole would benefit in the long run. We have started teaching our children that it’s much more important that the choices they make do not offend anyone than it is to weigh that choice on a moral and just scale. We do not teach them that something is wrong we just teach them when something is illegal. We arm them with knowledge of every technical subject imaginable but we do not instill any morality whatsoever. We must tip toe around the words God and Jesus in public these days because if we don’t we might inadvertently offend someone’s delicate sensibilities. The ban on prayer and Bible reading in public schools was spearheaded by a woman named Madalyn Murray O’Hair in the early sixties. She filed suit and won when she claimed that it was against her little five year old Billy’s constitutional rights to have to take a moment of silence in school at the beginning of the school day. I can only surmise that young master William must have come home one day from school and just went into a total rant about his first amendment rights being stepped all over by the man while he was at school that day. He had probably had just about enough of that I’m sure. Just as I am sure it had nothing to do with his mother being the founder and president of The American Atheist Association. Whatever the circumstances were she filed suit and won and in 1963 the first ban on Bible reading and prayer in public schools went into effect. The irony of this is that little Billy grew up to become a very strong Christian. In fact he is the chairman of the “Religious Freedom Coalition” and is very active in humanitarian efforts around the world. He of course denounces his mother’s stance on God and religion. Some people may argue that teaching kids about God is behavior modification and that this is a bad thing. They would argue that we should not impose our own personal views onto children and should just stick with the technical fundamentals. Apparently these people think that we should wait until they are hardened criminals behind bars before we try any type of behavior modification. Why spend so much money and effort on behavior modification with an adult once it’s too late and the crime is committed when we can start them off with using morality and justness as their guide lines. According to Infoplease.com since 1996 there has been 39 incidents of school shootings resulting in almost 100 people dead and dozens wounded. That is only in the last fourteen years. The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported findings from a survey taken between 2004 and 2008 that, “students ages 12 to 18 were victims of about 1.5 million non-fatal crimes when they were at school compared to about 1.1 million non-fatal crimes while they were away from school. Among high school students in grades 9-12, about 12% said they got into a fight on school property. Ten percent of male students and 5% of female students reported experiencing a threat or injury with a weapon on school property.” Children need to have a structured environment when it comes to learning everything else in life and we give that to them. We force them to learn everything that we think will be important to prepare them for a useful and productive life. Children have to be taught everything else in life so why aren’t we teaching them about morality and integrity also? When we want kids to behave at Christmas time we do not hesitate to use the line, “Santa is watching you.” It is not a bad thing for them to have the idea that God is watching over them and judging their actions. There is nothing bad in teaching them that there is a reason for trying to use moral standards when making a decision. One only has to watch the news to see what we are cranking out into the mainstream of humanity. A population of self centered and self seeking teens and adults that have no concept of the price of human life . We have given children way too much freedom and I’m sure there are parents in Columbine that will agree. We teach them only to be whatever they want to be, good or bad, and to do whatever feels good and is beneficial to them. We teach them everything else but we are afraid we will be infringing on their freedom if we teach them how to act. As a child growing up and going to school in the seventies, I never dreamed someone would walk into school and start killing everyone. I started school in 1969 which was just a few short years after the ban on prayer in public school went into effect. I remember the tail end of the Vietnam war, racial tension all around, the gas crisis and I remember the birth and death of disco. But I don’t remember once hearing about killing in school. I was never preoccupied with worrying about one of my fellow classmates killing me. There was of course the occasional bully but I never thought he would pull out a gun and shoot me. I might have worried he would beat my brains into a bloody pulp, but the fear of him shooting me never crossed my mind. Others may argue that we would be forcing our beliefs on our youth and that they are “people” and we should let them make their own decision if there is a God or not. To that I say we humans do not always choose what is good for us, especially as children. Every kid knows that broccoli is good for them but they do not usually choose it from the menu. We have to make them eat it until they acquire a taste for it and then learn to like it. They have to be taught that. Even if they don’t like it as adults, they might still eat it just because they know that it is good for them. So if we take the same approach about morality and prayer maybe as adults people will question their own actions before just doing what makes them feel good personally. I think that if more people had the concept that God is watching over them maybe they would think twice before taking what is not theirs or going to school and pulling out a semi automatic weapon. In this day and age it would not hurt for grammar school children to start the school day off with a prayer. That is not such a bad habit to have. We think nothing about shoving Santa Claus and the Easter bunny down the throats of our children so I see nothing wrong with a little God in the morning. A jolly magical man that circles the globe with flying reindeer is not a more positive message than the thought of an inclusive loving God. After all, these icons represent the spirit of GOD and JESUS in the first place so it is not such a bad thing to mention His name in public. Santa comes here on Jesus’ birthday and sneaks into our houses and gives presents to good boys and girls. The message is that if you are good, you get presents in the name of Jesus on His birthday. And on Easter, the day Jesus was resurrected, we learn that a rabbit comes hopping along and hides all the eggs we spent so much time coloring the night before. This is not a better role model than a peaceful man that spread love and kindness everywhere he went. We sing songs about Santa and the Easter bunny but we still cannot talk about God in public schools or anywhere else in public. The only reason prayer was ever banned in the first place was to please a self seeking group of people that had let their own lack of faith or anger at God muddle their rational thinking. They stood on the freedom from religious persecution amendment and actually helped undo a lot of what the constitution stands for. The cost of allowing an atheist organization lobby for freedom from religion has been too high and now we are paying the price. Prayer in public schools should be mandatory and if we ever want a chance at a peaceful planet full of compassionate people then we should embrace God more often than not. Works Cited LeBeau, Bryan F. “The Atheist: Madalyn Murray O’Hair” New York City, New York University Press. 2003. Print. Bureau of Justice Statistics. 2010. Web. 11 April 2010 http://bjs.ojp.isdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=44 All About History: School Prayer Case History. 2010. Web. 10 April 2010 http://www.allabouthistory.org/school-prayer.htm Time Line of Worldwide School Shootings. 2010. Web. 11 April 2010 http://www.inforplease.com/ipa/A0777958.html Prayer in School. 2010. Web. 22 April 2010 http://www.allaboutpopularissues.org/prayer-in-school.html