单选题
Prayer in Schools
The Reverend Jerry Falwell contends that up until about thirty years ago the precepts of the Bible were at the basis of the curriculum of public schools throughout the country. Prayer was offered and passages from the Bible were read virtually every day, and, because of that, the country and its citizens were better off. Falwell also claims that this was precisely what the founders of this country wanted. Quoting from President John Adams, who said that one means of preserving our Constitution was to "patronize every rational effort to encourage schools, colleges, universities and every institution for propagating knowledge, virtue and religion among all classes of the people," Falwell sees the recent elimination of school prayer as a contributing cause of the moral disintegration of society. Since in a democracy education is supposed to create better citizens, then schools must provide the moral foundation for that citizenry.
Senator John East pointed out that the phrase "separation of church and state" appears nowhere in the Constitution. If the government were required to eliminate all traces of religious practice, then "we could have no chaplains in the Armed Forces. We could have no religious facilities on military bases. We could not open the Senate or the House with prayer. We could not have "In God We Trust" on our coins. We could not say "God Save This Honorable Court" when the Supreme Court opens. We could not allow the President, at the conclusion of his Presidential oath, to say "...So Help Me God."" In short, prayer in the schools was favored by the founders, and to eliminate it, as the Supreme Court has ruled, neglects a crucial component of every child"s education.
Opponents of school prayer find major distortions in the current attacks against the "secularization" of schools and argue that the "materials [the opponents] advocate are consistent with historical traditions of character development while also being in tune with the present realities of the times."
Opponents also maintain that prayer in the schools violates the principle of religious freedom, as enunciated in the First Amendment to the Constitution. Institutionalizing school prayer in the classroom in effect makes it no longer voluntary. Senator Lowell Weicker has said that this issue relates to "whether or not each of us will be able to find our own way to God, bound in our own way, or whether we go back to the history which we had denied and allow the State to do that for us. The one is the first step, the other, the last, in the career of intolerance."
Opponents of prayer in the classroom are not unanimously against all prayer, but they feel that those who wish to pray together should do so in the privacy of their own homes or in their churches and synagogues. And finally, perhaps tongue-in-cheek, if children wish to pray in school, let them do so quietly and privately, since the Constitution"s Fifth Amendment guarantees everyone the right to remain silent.