School Prayer

First, I have to question the idea that there is so much violence in the schools, at least as concerns mass shootings. There have been a number of workplace shootings in recent years, a theatre full of people was shot up in Colorado, The Pulse shootings took place in a nightclub, Congressmen and their aides were attacked on a baseball diamond, and the Las Vegas shooter killed people in a plaza.

Second, there is a reason why school shootings are more common than, for example, shootings in railroad stations or Wal-Marts. The ability to reason properly is not fully developed before adulthood, and the school shooters have, in the main, been recent students.

They could at least offer a time of silence in order to pray if you want to. I don't know if I want the schools dictating what kind of prayers my kid prays.

It makes sense to provide a space for students to gather and pray together if they so wish. I'd be very wary of organised prayers in school simply because of the sense of imposition. If today we accept that our Christian prayers are imposed upon Muslim students we lose any right to complain in the future if Muslim prayers are imposed upon Christian students.

I think it's also hugely oversimplifying the issue to think that if only these youngsters were forced to pray to a deity they may not even acknowledge the violence would go away.

Students in American public schools can pray privately or publicly, read Bibles, meet in Christian clubs, wear Christian symbols, and express their religious opinions. What else is desired?

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