Let's get a few things straight:
- I'm a Christian.
- I'm a father of elementary school age kids.
- I'm a public school teacher.
- My kids go to a private school.
- I'm a conservative.
- I'm heart broken for the parents, communities and children of CT.
- I'm not interested in prayer in schools.
What?! Every Christian with a bible is ranting "God has been removed from schools and that's why we're...." Yes, I've heard that argument and I've even made it a couple of times. However it's wrong and it's not very smart. There is a talk show host who went as far as to say the reason this horrible event happened is because God has been taken out of schools.
What most people are asking for is a teacher-lead, school-lead time of prayer during a time of the day. 30 seconds during announcements, before lunch or something like that.
Putting prayer in school is opening a box to so many other things that teachers will have to tend to. I'm surprised no one has said it. We're already, Parents, Coaches, Advisers, Counselors, Teachers, Nurses and Referees. Now you want us to be Pastors, Priests and Rabbis?
Let me just wave a magic wand and "put prayer in school". Can't you see/hear all the howls from some parents because "you prayed in Jesus' name, we pray in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit".
...or You prayed in the NIV, but we only accept the KJV.
How about this one, ...We're Southern Baptist and you're a Mormon teacher, What Jesus are you talking about?
These are just a few, a very small few complaints out of the bag of insane complaints we'd hear. Let's not even talk about the fact that now America is a sort of kind of Christian. So many assume we're talking about praying to the Judeo-Christian God. Ok, but what about when America becomes a majority non-Christian nation? Think you'll be ok with us praying to another god that you don't think is God?
Ok, people, we're tasked with such a weighty chore that adding one more layer is going to only add more strain to the profession. I challenge that there isn't one profession that has so much heaped on it from all sides as teaching. If you know of one, please let me know.
For quite some time teaching has been the surrogate parent of the community. I know a lot of folk aren't going to like this, but you're welcome to comment. We've become EVERYTHING to these kids and it's made really, seriously...LAZY PARENTS. Yes, I did call most of us lazy. We drop our children off at school with very little and want a college bound, scholar in return. This might be shocking, but it's not going to happen. Neither is prayer in school.
If you want prayer in school send Prayers to school. Send kids who cherish the honor of speaking to an ever loving, God. Drop off a child who are confident in themselves, because they know that no matter what they're accepted by God and that He thinks they're pretty neat. Send students who much rather quote Be Attitudes than cop and attitude. We'd welcome students who rather than pick on each other and name call understand that everybody needs love and acceptance and they've found that in God. How do we get that, Jason?
This is going to REALLY make some people mad, so feel free to log off. In order to get the kind of student I'm talking about many parents need to parent and pastor their OWN kids. You're going to have to put prayer, God and all that in your home. Put it in your heart and in your kids hearts. I can tell you that the Love of God is absent from my community. I can see it in the words my kids use with each other and adults. It's obvious in the MIA status of support at home. I as a teacher am not going to do it for you. Sorry, but it ain't going to happen. What I will do is pray silently that you get a clue that these are your kids, your future and that you need to make the most of it.
I choose to make my wife and my faith a center of our girls' growth. If you don't that's on you. I simply believe it's much easier for you to raise your child than for your child's teacher or school to do it for you.
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