On School Prayer and the Pledge

Post Reply New Topic

An essay I wrote about 2 years ago.

I'm really tired of hearing Christians whine about not having prayer in school and that we want "under God" taken out of the pledge. "Under God" has only been there since 1954 - so we managed to win 2 world wars and get through the Great Depression without becoming communist or a dictatorship without God's help, so there's no reason to have it now. How would you feel if it was "Under Allah" and there were readings from the Koran, or "Under Vishnu" and readings from Hindu texts, or "Under the Flying Spaghetti Monster" and reading pasta recipes? Not mentioning any god or having any prayer is neutrality, not promoting atheism. Promoting atheism would be "One nation intelligent enough to not believe in any gods" and reading from Atheist Universe or Losing Faith in Faith. Seems plenty of Christians are only happy when they can force their nonsense down everyone else's throat. Just like something out of 1984 - you say we oppress you when we don't let you oppress everyone else. We need to start following the constitution. You have plenty of time to kiss up to your invisible sky daddy at home and in church. Just leave the rest of us out of it!

What are you talking about in relation to school prayer? There is no mandatory school prayer in the US that I'm aware of, not even in some of the most conservative regions of the country.

By the way, where's the essay you mentioned at the start of your post?

Although I am and always have been an atheist I went through the New York school system in the 1930's and we pledged allegiance every morning and some of the classes read the Lords Prayer (it was a publiv school) which was probably illegal but neither I nor any of the other kids tried to make sense of the words we repeated by rote (and "one nation indivisible" frequently became "one nation invisible") and it had no effect at all on my religious or patriotic convictions.

Aye.

I speak as a Brit, and we have a 'state religion' over here, and we're obliged to have an act of worship in schools every day. At my own school - which wasn't a religious school, BTW - assembly used to get hijacked by a small but vociferous group of Evangelical Christians (some teachers, some pupils). As did a lot of other things in the school, like what jewelry you could and couldn't wear as part of uniform (crosses yes, Star of David no), or what you couldn't write in the school magazine.

You couldn't opt out of assembly, even if you were over 16 (the official age at which you're free to choose your own religion in the UK) unless you had a letter from your parents requesting it. And many parents didn't feel strongly enough to make that request, even if their kids did. I believe this may still be the case.

According to article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, everyone has the right to freedom of religion. That should include the freedom to opt out of a religion, or any manifestation of a religion (such as prayers), which you don't agree with. Those of you who have separation of Church and State enshrined in your laws should take every possible care to make sure that doesn't get violated.

It greatly saddens me that church and state in Sweden has only been seperated since 2000, and May 1 is one of the only holidays without religious basis.

I am for keeping Church and State separate!

Not everybody in the US now believes in the same religion.

I recall in 1996, as a first grader, my class recited
the Pledge of Allegiance every morning, except when
there was a substitute teacher.

Those two words were said by everyone out loud without interruption.

It's very disturbing that super-right-wing people of faith
want school prayer. Instead of school prayer, here is a solution.
This may not work, but it's much better than prayer in school.

Get any student, regardless of age, to participate in community service.
Depending on age, the community service must be appropriate
enough for the student. However, will the student be interested?

I'm very strongly against mandatory community service in schools.

On the subject of the pledge, yes I agree God should be taken out. (Then again, as someone here pointed out, who's God are we talking about?)

And on the subject of prayer in school, it annoys me as well. I was just visiting family in Delaware and on a board walk there there was a store that had a T-Shirt that said something around these lines:

"Student: God, why do you allow so much violence in schools?

God: I'm not aloud in schools."

Honestly, prayer is not restricted in school. (Nor should it be) You can pray at lunch, or in the hall ways or whatever. But no, you cannot stand up suddenly and interrupt class and pray or anything like that. (Maybe you can put your hands together quietly or something like that) But the main issue is that it shouldn't be a mandatory thing.