Religion in Public Schools
By: Venidikt • Essay • 856 Words • May 14, 2010 • 1,199 Views
Religion in Public Schools
In the past Religion was confined to the state now with religious freedom everything has changed or at least started to change. In order for religion to be in a private school now it is again trying to be in Public schools. People ask "why can't freedom to acknowledge god be enjoyed again by children in every schoolroom across this land?" In the past, a long time ago children always prayed before class started and before lunch. But things h
ave changed, "in 1791 the separation of church and state" started. Although it was made clear about the separation of the two "as late as 1951 some twenty states permitted schools to begin the day by reading aloud a passage of the bible." Bu t that had to stop. People didn't have the same beliefs when it comes to religion, if a family absent even believe in god why should their child be forced to pray? On many different occasions questions similar to this one were brought up and complained about. That is what started it all real big.
When complaining, arguing and fighting all started over the silent moment. In 1978 a few lawyers got together and considered a constitutional law. The original law said that public school teachers in gr ades 1-6 "shall announce that a period of silence, not to exceed one minute, shall be observed for meditation." This law did not work for long, because it still allowed oral prayer in public high schools. Later in 1981, the Alabama State Senator D onald G. Holmes successfully passed a bill that included all grades calling it "the moment of silence" this law said that "the teacher (was) to announce that the silent moment may be used for voluntary prayer." Although it would have to be si lent prayer. Even after this new law started the lawyers that were opposed to this were trying to say that students "do not have a right to pray in school" silently or otherwise because of growing impressions that affetc
their life. The silent mom ent supposedly "(forced) religion on children." I don't agree with that at all, if there has to be a moment of silence then any child can use that moment however he or she wants, it does not necessarily have to be used fro prayer. Usually "the chi ldren who have been brought up with prayer or some type of religion are usually proven to be better" kids. I have friends who go to private schools where praying in class out loud is perfetc
ly O.K. and normal. This praying in the classroom usually would have a pretty good size affetc
on the rest of a person's life. Although when praying aloud it could force one type of religion on a student rather than having them have more of a choice of what type of religion they want or if they even want to ha ve a religion. When there would be the religion in the classrooms. "School children not participating in the prayers or the bible readings (would be) asked or required to leave the room."0 This has been