There is a very good reason why teacher-led prayer is not permitted in public schools: the public pays teachers to educate, not preach or pray. The only morals they are required to enforce are those mandated by the school and the law: don’t steal, don’t hurt each other, respect each other’s person and property, etc. Anything more than that is the responsibility of the families.
Of course students can pray all they want on their own. At least when I was in school, we had 4 minutes between classes, plus 8-minute morning and afternoon breaks, and about 45 minutes for lunch. Plenty of time for the students that are so inclined to pray to their contentment. Anyone who challenges that is obstructing their rights protected by the First Amendment.
So what did the Founding Fathers intend with the First Amendment? What were they thinking? We’ll never be able to ask them, but we can develop an educated opinion by reading their essays and correspondence. Would the FF be opposed to prayer in school? We must examine their writings to draw a conclusion. However, in my opinion, it doesn’t look good for the prayer crowd.
Many were avowed Deists, meaning they believed in the Creator, but that His word is found in nature and science, not in the Bible. Many considered the Bible to be a collection of superstitions and fables. In January 1802, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter to the Danbury Baptists, “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislative should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.”
Jefferson was not alone. Thomas Paine, author of “Common Sense,” also authored, “Age of Reason,” a Deist text railing against the Bible and revealed religions like Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. George Washington, Ethan Allen, and Benjamin Franklin were also prominent Deists. Franklin wrote in his autobiography, “Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle’s Lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist.”
Do they sound like they would appreciate school officials praying for blessings before a football game or a Jewish text which includes commandments on how to worship God being displayed in the classroom?
Finally, what did Jesus himself say on the matter of public prayer? See Matthew 6:5-6
In conclusion, the First Amendment guarantees that all people have a right to worship or not worship the Creator however they see fit, and the government, no matter how subtly, has no place in that worship. Our schools’, government’s, and parents’ time and energy would be better spent educating students about the history of this country and lives of its founders than quibbling over whether or not schools should be used as places of worship.