Monday, May 5, 2014
Prayer In Schools
As we were discussing the Evangelical movement in class today, I for one was very surprised when Mr. Stewart said that thirty percent of Americans identified as evangelicals. Thirty percent isn't a majority, but still accounts for over one hundred million people in today’s America. Before we discussed the Evangelical movement I didn’t know religion could have such a huge effect on elections. Even though the Evangelicals were credited with president Reagan's victory, he failed to implement many of the policies the evangelical movement stood for such as the outlawing of abortion and prayer in schools. These are both controversial topics that the evangelical movement hopes to address through its political activism. The debate over prayer in schools is a topic that affects us as students, and is still a hot topic in our government today. Evangelicals make the argument that prayer can only be beneficial and even students who aren’t necessarily religious could still benefit from classroom prayer. On the other hand, an amendment requiring prayer in schools may encroach on people freedom of religion. What do you think about prayer in schools? Should it be required?
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Personally, I don't think it should be required, as there may be students and families that take offense to the necessity of having it. However, I do think that a solution of sorts for this problem can be found in private schools. Many private schools are religion-based, and are allowed to control more aspects of their students lives at school. Prayer could be (and in some cases, is) required within private schools, allowing the people who wish to pray during school hours to congregate at one school, and those who do not wish to pray during school attend different ones.
ReplyDeleteI definitely think that public schools should not require prayer. Prayer is much more often than not associated with a particular religion, and to force students to adhere to any religious practice or aspect of a particular religion would be infringing on their right to freedom of religion. While it is said that prayer in public schools could to be "non-religious based" and only inspire faith and reverence within students, to practice such prayer across the entire country would be nearly impossible; teachers leading prayer would begin to add in bits of whatever their own beliefs are even if it is done unconsciously. The other problem that could arise would be the position of Atheists, who do not believe in a greater being. What then, would they do?
ReplyDeleteAs Kelli said above, it is perfectly acceptable to require prayer at private schools. Although not all students at these schools may be of the same religion, they choose to attend these schools of their own accord.
Evangelicals saying that prayer in school is only a benefit conveniently leave out the problem created for those who may not be Christian. Evangelicals seem to want to pretend that every American is a Christian, and ignore the obvious problem that some who adhere to other religions will have with being required to pray in school. I believe it speaks more to the Evangelicals' ignorance that they believe prayer in school can be of no negative consequence to anyone.
ReplyDeleteExcellent inquiry, Peter! I, personally, believe that prayer in schools should be supported but not encouraged. I know that even many private schools such as Saint Francis advocate the orthodox "religion" or similar self betterment class but do not force students to pray. Another thing to mention is the chaos that highly sensitive topics such as religion could cause in a school environment. Kids who have been brought up one way may be disrespectful to another kid who believes something different and this could start conflict. On the other hand, religion usually does promote well-being and good acts, so the availability of a time to pray may be beneficial to some but idle time for others.
ReplyDeleteI think requiring prayers in public schools is an affront to separation of church and state. When children receive their rightful education, they should not be unwillingly subjected to the practices of a religion they do not identify with.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that prayer should be required in schools, since that's definitely a violation of freedom of religion. If some evangelicals (I don't want to generalize) think that students need more education about religion and faith in public schools, an elective course about different religions could be an option that would be a good compromise. It wouldn't be a required course but could be taken by those interested. It would be a lot of work to make that a fair course about all religions, though, so it's probably easier to keep things how they are. We have religious clubs on campus, which are a good option for religious students to meet with others of their religion within the school.
ReplyDeleteWhen President Kennedy was running for the seat for president, people had doubts about him since he was a Catholic, not a protestant christian. However, he made sure that he put religion apart from the state. I personally know a Catholic nun who is very educated about American history and she seems to have a negative perspective towards the evangelicals. I am not quite sure if it's a religious issue but I know for a fact that she is a very liberal Catholic. From this, I think the evangelicals have been scorned by other religious groups due to them pressing on private religious affairs and matters on to other religion/groups and even venturing into the states.
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