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blah blah cock blah oversial widespread issue today is the right to have prayer in public schools. The proposed amendment reads: To secure the people s right to acknowledge God according to the dictates of conscience. The people s rights to pray and to recognize their belief, heritage or traditions on public property, shall not be infringed. The government shall not require any person to join in the prayer or religious activity, initiate or designate school prayers, discriminate against any religion, or deny equal access to benefit on account of religion. (AVSP) This would permit but not mandate school prayer. I think that the government should be focused on the school s academics, not what religion they are to study. The proposed amendments would cause nothing but trouble considering that there would be many arguments on what beliefs should be taught. Religion is private and schools are public. Having any prayer in school goes against the basis in which our country was formed upon. America came into being because colonists wanted religious freedom. Our founding fathers carefully wrote the constitution to grant the freedom of separation of church and state. A prayer created and supported by a government violate the very essence of the spirit in which the US was formed. (Haas35) Therefore, having a prayer in school would be unconstitutional. A radical school prayer amendment would attack the heart and soul of the bill of rights which safeguards the rights of the individual from tyranny of the individual. (Jasper96) Teachers are public employees, paid by the taxpayers. The time it takes to recite a prayer is an expenditure of tax dollars. (Haas36 ) This is a violation of the separation of church and state. This whole issue is a big waste of time because students do have the right to pray at school. No one can stop them from praying individually, silently, or personally. this right has never, and could never be outlawed. (AVSP ) The real motive is to install group prayer.(The Case Against School Prayer) I feel that the school day is not that long, and that if one feels obligated to express their beliefs in a group, there is plenty of time after school. There are so many things that could be argued in this amendment. If passed it would be a never ending war of religious beliefs. Oppressers to the amendment view that since education is mandatory, how can public schools impose one religious prayer on all students? (New American Coalition) If a religion was brought into the classroom, it would build walls for children who are not aware of religious differences. (Case Against School Prayer) Public school districts are made of many different types of people with many different religious beliefs. Students would not be forced to pray but the minority would feel singled out.( Jasper 108) Many religious people are against this proposed amendment. In reality, the only way to make people of different religious beliefs feel comfortable would be to make the prayers cross cultural. However, any watered down prayer would result in the deeply religious finding it meaningless, and an infringement on students who follow no religion. (Democratic Alliance for Action)) Even religious Christians oppose the amendment. They say that the bible warns against public prayer. And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners, but when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray… (Bible) In conclusion, this issue of school prayer could never be passes. It is unconstitutional and would deny the United States of America its most cherished characteristic, freedom. There are many ways that this problem can be solved for those who argue and worry about it. These people can either send their kids to a private school that will help them to learn their particular religious belief on an everyday basis, teach their children after school, or form prayer groups at their own private homes. 1. The Bible. Matthew 6:5-6. 2. Concentric. (1999). Religious Freedom Amendment. [World Wide Web] Available:http://www.concentric.net/Dannemyr/rfa.htm. 3. Democratic Alliance for Action. (1997). Bible Believers Should Oppose School Prayer. [World Wide Web] Available:http://www.daa.org/prayer.html. 4. Freethought. The Case Against School Prayer. (1999) [World Wide Web] Available:http://www.freethought.org/org/fff/pray.html. 5. Haas, Carol. Engle v. Vitale. New York: Enslow; 1994. 6. Jasper, Margeret C. Religion and the Law. New York: Oceana, 1998. 7. New America Coalition. school Prayer. [World Wide Web] Available:http://www.newamerica.org/prayer.html.Should a Catholic school be reimbursed by the state for school supplies?

Should there be time set aside in school for kids to pray? These are some ofthe many questions the U.S. Supreme Court asks themselves when they areconfronted with cases involving religion in school. Although there are somesound supporting arguments for prayer in school, the opposing argumentsmore than justify the non-religious atmosphere of public school. Supportingarguments for In School Prayer have little validity. For instance one argumentis that the framers of the constitution were religious, so they didn t mean toprohibit all government sponsored prayer or acknowledgment of GOD. Thisis assuming one way just to be in favor of the In School Prayer idea.Pro-Prayer activists also believe that it is VERY important for the nation schildren to have religious values instilled in them. I strongly disagree with thisstatement solely because they are assuming that someone without a religionhas lower or no values as compared to a religious person. Valid arguments onthis side of the issue are rare, but they do exist. One example is that in publicpolls, seventy-eight percent of the nations thinks prayer in public schools is agood idea. This logical at first, but the truth is many polls convey the notionthat voluntary prayer before, after, and during school is forbidden. Anotherargument addresses the fact that religion is already everywhere anyway. It ison our currency, our leaders are sworn into office with reference to GOD, and our flag salute also contains religious statements. These are good points toaddress, however, I believe they are wrong as well. Two wrongs don t makea right. Opposing arguments are a lot more convincing than the supportingpoints. First of all, students have the right to conduct religious practices onschool property, so there is no need to set aside specific time in the curriculumfor prayer. Secondly, how could a school have prayer without segregatingpeople into religious and non-religious groups? Finally, prayer serves nopurpose in a school curriculum, some may argue that it helps to teach goodhabits, but there are many other ways to teach good habits than just religion.On a closing note, In School Prayer has its supporters and opposers. Mypersonal opinion is obviously that this is a completely ludicrous notion anddoesn t have any substantial support for it.In 1962 the Supreme Court decided that public schools did not have the power to authorize schoolprayer. This decision made public school inthe U.S. more atheistic than many European nations. For example, crosses still hangon the classroom walls in Poland, and the TenCommandments are displayed in Hungary. There areprayers held at the beginning of legislativeand judicial sessions and every President hasmentioned a divine power in his inauguralspeech. In keeping with a spirit of religiousfreedom as stated in the First Amendment, thereis no reason why students should not be allowedto have a moment of silence during the school day whenthey can pray or do as they choose.The case Engel v. Vitale in 1962 decided that school prayer is unconstitutional. With this case, it was pointed out that the students were to “voluntarily” recite the following prayer:”Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers, and our country.”The court ruled that this rule was unconstitutionalaccording to the First Amendment’s “establishment clause,” which states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” In response tothe Engel v.Vitale case some schools adopted a”moment of silence.” In 1963, another case was brought before the courtdealing with school prayer, Abington School District v. Schempp. The Schempp family challenged a law in Pennsylvania requiring the students to say ten verses of the Bible before school. These readings from the Bible were declared unconstitutional. Members of the board felt reading the Bible would give the children more moral values. The Schempp family strongly disagreed. Members of Congress attempted to find a compromise. From this effort came the adoption of the moment of silence, which is guaranteed by the First Amendment’s “Free Exercise” clause.Six states now permit silent moments — Georgia,Virginia, Maryland, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama. Silent prayer was ruled constitutional in 1985 as long as it had no religious intent orpurpose. (Newsweek, October 3, 1994)Prayer has been banned in schools for thirty-threeyears. The moment of silence has been ruled constitutional, however. Every student fills amoment of silence in a different way: through