Children can pray in schools

 It is commonly said that children can't pray in schools. That isn't true. I also hear that the Supreme Court has disallowed prayer in school. That also isn't true. All that ended, was organized prayer as led by a teacher, principal or directed by the school. The problem before the Court rulings dealing with organized prayer in schools was that students were required or pressured to participate in prayer not of their religion, if they had a religion.

No government or school board committee has the right to teach a certain religious view that the parents of those students might disagree with. Those that advocate organized prayer back in public schools state students wouldn’t be forced to pray but ironically it was some of those condemned church/state court decisions from the 1940s through 1960s that dealt with children forced to pray or pressured to pray by teachers and the school. While the phrase “separation of church and state” does not in fact appear in our Constitution it was not penned though by judges as some believe, though it was referenced by judges in later court cases.

 It was in a letter written by President Jefferson, after consultation with advisers, on the ideal that government and religion should have separation between them. Now, President Jefferson was not a signer to the Constitutional Convention but James Madison not only was but is considered to be the Father of the Constitution and wrote very similar sentiments. Mr. Madison wrote in a letter to Edward Livingston in 1822, “Every new and successful example of a perfect separation between ecclesiastical and civil matters is of importance.” In an 1819 letter to Gene Garman, “The civil government functions with complete success by the total separation of Church and State.”

As a nonbeliever, like most nonbelievers, I am not offended by people praying in public buildings. I just don’t want the government organizing prayer or religious exercises. That is all. I am not miserable because I don’t believe in God or life after death. Other people have those beliefs and that is fine. Atheists are not unhappy and wretched with misery. I heard a Christian state once why do nonbelievers believe in atoms but not God when they cannot see neither. Well, an atom is observed scientifically through various experiments that have been repeated many, many numerous times. There is conclusive scientific evidence that atoms do exist. If they did not, then nuclear energy or nuclear bombs would not work at all let alone other advanced technology.

That a God is necessary for the universe leaves God unexplained and while I understand Christians say God doesn’t need a cause that just isn’t a sufficient explanation for nonbelievers. Why the universe needs a cause but a cause we can’t observe doesn’t need a cause doesn’t make sense to me. An explanation that God is immaterial doesn’t make.