By: Nikki Wise, Charger Staff
Prayer in public schools has been an issue for several years. The fact that our student body cannot lead a public prayer is unconstitutional.
It is everyone's right to have a prayer and a scripture reading to start the day. The First Amendment states,"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;...."
Unfortunately, this amendment has been misinterpreted and corrupted. Sure it is the Amendment that separates church from state, but as government expands into more aspects of life, religion is pushed away to guarantee that separation.
The true meaning of the Amendment was that the writers of it didn't want a national church that would enforce laws based on a certain religion and have everyone forced to have to participate on one religion.
In the Engel v. Vitale case the parents that were against school prayer (Engel) argued that prayer in school violates the First Amendment and the Establishment Clause by promoting specific beliefs and ways of worship.
The Regents' Prayer was the main focus of controversy. The lawyers noted that the Regents' Prayer was of no tradition or heritage ("In God We Trust," which is on all coinage and paper money is an example of this national tradition;) therefore, they recognized it by introducing religion into education.
The lawyers concluded that the practice of the Regents' Prayer "rejects the belief on which the 'Founding Fathers' built our national government, belief in the necessity for absolute separation of church and state. It threatens not merely to breach the 'wall of separation,' but to undermine it completely."
The officials that were for school prayer argued that no students were "being subjected in the schools to any sectarian or other formal religious teaching."
The officals were in favor of the Regents' Prayer, saying the Establishment Clause does not prohibit public prayer nor violate the separation of church and state. The Supreme Court was in favor of Engel's point of view.
Not everybody however, should be forced to participate. If they were forced, this would violate the First Amendment.
Students should be able to choose whether or not they want to pray and if they choose to not even be in the atmosphere of people praying they should have the right to simply step outside of the classroom until it is over. Just like the many students that say the Pledge of Allegiance, they have a right to do so or not.
I also believe that if we put prayer back into our schools, we will more than likely have less violence. More students will respect their teachers and will think twice about bringing a gun to school.
I don't know about anyone else, but I always have a better day when I start it out with a short prayer. It always gives me a peace of mind that everything is going to be all right no matter what happens.
Let's have a prayer instead of a moment of silence; Let's have a scripture instead of a quote of the day; Let us have God back into our schools.
This page created by Tawanna Bradley