# Wishing Church and State Were MORE Separate

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wishing-church-and-state-were-more-separate/31392>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [August 30, 2000, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wishing-church-and-state-were-more-separate/31392 "2000-08-30T19:33:16Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\
**Post date:** [August 31, 2000, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wishing-church-and-state-were-more-separate/31392/41 "2000-08-31T21:47:14Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by jenkinsfan \*  
> \*\*
> 
> > [@](#):
> >
> > \*Originally posted by VarlosZ \*
> > 
> > \*\*What is usually meant by “student-led prayer” (and I have a sneaking suspision that this is what jenkinsfan means by it, to) is something like this:
> > 
> > _[8:30 AM. School bell rings in homeroom.]_
> > 
> > _Teacher_: Good morning class.  
> > _All_: Good Morning Ms. Wormwood!  
> > _Teacher_: Before we begin classes, I think Fred has something to say. Fred?  
> > _Fred [followed by the rest of the class]_: Our Father, Who Art in Heaven. . .
> > 
> > This is not to say that Fred is necessarily being prompted by Ms. Wormwood to pray; he may very well have come to her first. Still, the fact that school time is being set aside for worship is aggregiously wrong. The government is facilitating Fred’s witnessing by giving him a captive audience. Would the atheist then be aloud to give a 2 minute speech on the evils of organized religion and the inherent logic of atheism? I think not. \*\*
> 
> I’ve never pictured it exactly that way. I see school prayer as a group of students gathering around a flag pole with a senior leading them in prayer. I can see your concern about the unspoken teacher endorsement if a Jew or someone from another religion felt out of place. \*\*

**jenkinsfan** , the picture you present is not one that causes me (nor any other NRITPS\* folk I know) any problems. In fact, most of the schools here have something along those lines. The (dread) ACLU has protected the rights of extra-curricular religious student groups if the school allows _any_ extra-curricular student groups.

**BUT** (and for those of us in the Bible Buckle, that is one huge BUT), the picture presented by **VarlosZ** is what often (if not usually) happens in reality.  
For example, the recent USSC decision regarding prayer at football games. [WARNING: VAST OVERSIMPLIFICATION FOLLOWS] The reasoning of the Court was based on these facts: the school had an (~20 year, IIRC) history of _mandated_ school prayer; the school and town had a history of complaints by students & their families of religious discrimination, persecution and harassment (primarily against Jehovah’s Witness & Catholic families); the school administration & school board had essentially stated that the ‘student-led’ prayer was a gimmick to get around previous court decisions that ruled against mandated, school-led prayers; and the ‘majority rules’ nature of the system used to choose the student prayer-leader guaranteed that only Christian prayers by a certain sect would ever be allowed.

I heard radio interviews with some of the high school students. They stated that there should be no problem with prayers at the football games, because they were ‘voluntary’ and ‘student-led’. However, they also said that no students of minority religions should be allowed to lead the prayers, because those were false religions.

IOW, the school (read: agent of the state of Texas and of the US govt) was basically establishing that only one sect of Christianity was a religion valid enough to be allowed to pray publicly.  
Did you read [this](http://www.ffrf.org/fttoday/december95/zellner.html)? (Thanks, **Opus1**.)  
I could give you numerous personal anecdotes from my life as well as the lives of my family and friends, examples of how an unthinking majority that assumes everyone believes or SHOULD believe as they do can (sometimes unwittingly) harass, discriminate and even threaten children of minority beliefs (including non-belief).  
It is these sorts of incidents that cause many of us to be SO VERY VERY WARY of _any_ religious display or speech in the schools. As I and others have stated, there is NO PROBLEM with students praying in school, as long as it’s something they do on their own, on their own time, without inflicting it on other students.

* * *

\*No Religion In The Public Schools. I also thought of Separation Of Church And State. Is there a word that means ‘all those of the many & varied beliefs that agree that religion does not belong in the public schools, except as individuals choose to practice it privately’? I sure couldn’t think of one this afternoon.

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