Prayer In Public Schools

One of the things that we learn when going out into the world of working people is that there are two things that we must never engage in, and that is religion and politics. In today’s world, that has become a thing of the past. Religion and politics have become the mainstream conversation from backyard BBQ’s to the boardrooms of corporations.

One of the beautiful things about being an American is knowing that we have the Constitution of the United States that provides the ultimate law of the land to govern our country in a fair and unbiased way. We are a melting pot of people from all walks of life. That is why it would be impossible for the United States of America to establish a certain religion.

When our forefathers wrote the Constitution, they thought the first thing of importance was to establish a law about religion. This law was not to establish a religion in our country but to prohibit the free exercise of religion.  The First Amendment contains the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause that prohibit the government from establishing an official religion or mandating prayer.

The Alabama House of Representatives has passed a law in our State to amend the Alabama Constitution to mandate the Pledge of Allegiance and a voluntary period of prayer in public schools. Republican Reed Ingram proposed a constitutional amendment to mandate this change, obviously ignoring that the Constitution of the United States has already decided this. The bill, as initially filed by Ingram, threatened to withhold 25 percent of state funding to schools that do not conduct the pledge of allegiance to start each school day, or boards that fail to make a timely vote on voluntary prayer time.  However, Rep. David Faulkner, a Republican from Montgomery, offered an amendment that stripped that language while also changing the bill to require any prayer to be student-initiated and led.  This bill will now go to the Alabama Senate to be decided.

Speaker Ledbetter has said that our country was founded on Christian values. This is simply not true. Religious extremists insist that our country was founded to be officially Christian and that our laws should enforce the doctrines of their version of Christianity. There is no language in the Constitution that gives special treatment or preference to Christianity. The Constitution of the United States is a secular document that contains no mention of Christianity.

There are so many different religions in our country that a conflict is likely to occur.  The Catholic Church does not teach Jewish culture, nor does a Protestant Church teach either one. We have private schools all over America that are run by different religions. If a parent wants their children to be exposed to their religion, would it not be a better idea to send their child to that particular school?

The separation of church and state is a philosophical and jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the State. The term refers to the creation of a secular state and to disestablishment, the changing of an existing, formal relationship between the church and the state.

In 1962, the Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional for a teacher to lead a class in prayer at a public school. In 2025, the Supreme Court decided another case that involved prayer at public schools. In this case, the high court ruled that a high school football coach in Washington has a constitutional right to pray at midfield following games.

In the United States, public schools cannot mandate, organize, or endorse prayer due to the First Amendment Establishment Clause. Students have the right to engage in voluntary, private, student-initiated prayer during non-instructional time, such as lunch and/or recess.  Teachers and Officials are required to remain neutral and cannot promote or discourage religious activity.

We must also understand that opening the door to mandate that public schools provide for prayer means ALL religions. The lawmakers in Montgomery are forgetting the fact that no discrimination should be made against any religion if we intend to open our doors to prayer in public schools. This would also include the “other side” of Christianity.

The Satanic Temple was founded in 2013 and has a headquarters in Salem, Massachusetts. They claim the reason behind establishing this foundation was their response to the intrusion of Christian values into American politics. They view Satan as neither a supernatural being nor a symbol of evil. Instead, they believe in the literary Satan as a symbol of the eternal rebel rising up against arbitrary authority.

We have already seen this come about in Florida. In 2013, a group of Satanists assembled at the Florida State Capitol to support the bill Gov Rick Scott signed into law, which allowed student-led prayer at school assemblies. The group further stated that as the bill did not specify a religion, the prayers could be led by a student from any religion, including Satanism.  How many of us really want our children exposed to Satanism at such a valuable age?  Be careful what you wish for. If the Senate passes this bill in Alabama, the door is open to all religions, even the ones that may not promote a Christian message.

Lynda Kirkpatrick

*This article does not reflect the opinions of the Marion County Democratic Party