.....You want me to do all this with a piece of chalk,Well, here's what I think:
a blackboard, a bulletin board, a few books,
a big smile, and a starting salary that qualifies me for food stamps.
'You want me to do all this and then you tell me ....
I CAN'T PRAY?
The above e-mail goes around often. As I used to tell my students, a person can pray ANYWHERE, and a person can pray silently. So one can pray in a school building or any other place all day long if he/she desires regardless. In Matthew 6, Jesus explains where, when, and what to pray. To use the vernacular, what would Jesus do?
When you have a classroom of 30 hormone ridden, sleepy teenaged students in the morning, it's about all you can do to check roll, maintain order, and start class. Same with six yr. olds without the hormones. They're not listening anyway. Time is of the essence. There are hundreds of interruptions throughout the day which slow down the "learning process."
Prayer in school will not make a Muslim a Christian; it will not make any non-Christian a Christian. It will not turn a Catholic into a protestant or vice versa. And...it will not make a bad kid good. Public praying in school is merely a show for the Protestants (in the south) to say "look at me; I'm a good Christian". That doesn't make a hill of beans to a kid from another religion. And frankly, I think its wrong to expect that it will. It's all just a big SHOW!
There is usually a "moment of silence" along with the pledge of allegiance in the mornings. That's when everybody prays in their own way. The kids that want to do so have private prayer groups that meet before the first bell rings. That's a good thing, because the kids that don't want to join in don't have to.
And that's what I think about praying in public school.
(c) 2011 B. E. MacKie
When you have a classroom of 30 hormone ridden, sleepy teenaged students in the morning, it's about all you can do to check roll, maintain order, and start class. Same with six yr. olds without the hormones. They're not listening anyway. Time is of the essence. There are hundreds of interruptions throughout the day which slow down the "learning process."
Prayer in school will not make a Muslim a Christian; it will not make any non-Christian a Christian. It will not turn a Catholic into a protestant or vice versa. And...it will not make a bad kid good. Public praying in school is merely a show for the Protestants (in the south) to say "look at me; I'm a good Christian". That doesn't make a hill of beans to a kid from another religion. And frankly, I think its wrong to expect that it will. It's all just a big SHOW!
There is usually a "moment of silence" along with the pledge of allegiance in the mornings. That's when everybody prays in their own way. The kids that want to do so have private prayer groups that meet before the first bell rings. That's a good thing, because the kids that don't want to join in don't have to.
And that's what I think about praying in public school.
(c) 2011 B. E. MacKie
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