The Pinch: Caught in the Middle of the School Prayer Debate and Other Church/State Stuff

By Rev.Tim Pauls

On the one side, there are those who say that church and state should be totally separate, that religion has no place in public life.

If you want to give it a name, call it secularism. Among other things, secularism teaches that there should be no prayer in public schools, no nativity scenes at city hall or public displays of the Ten Commandments in parks. Taken to the extreme, secularism also seeks to remove “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance. Secularism has made a lot of progress over the past sixty-five years (It’s hard to believe that many public schools used to begin the day with students reciting the Lord’s Prayer!), usually by filing lawsuits. It didn’t used to be this way. President Thomas Jefferson signed legislation that sent money to Jesuit priests in part for the purpose of spreading the Gospel among American Indians. No, when the United States was a young country, government could interact with religion as long as the government did not show favoritism. That’s what the First Amendment to the United States Constitution says. Nevertheless, secularism has changed a lot of things and continues to push hard.

On the other side, there are those who argue that nearly all religions should be in public life, especially schools. Call it multiculturalism. The argument goes like this: it’s important to study culture, and religion is just a part of culture. You can’t understand India unless you study Hinduism. You can’t understand the Middle East unless you study Islam. You can’t understand Israel without studying Judaism. Therefore, students should study religion in public school, and they do study religions like Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism. There’s one problrm though. Students may not study Christianity.Why? Because while the other religions belong to certain cultures, Christianity does not. It’s all over the world, not just in India or the Middle East. Therefore, it’s just a religion and shouldn’t be in school. (Note two problems with multiculturalism. For one, try studying European or early American history and culture without tripping over Christianity. For another, note that when multiculturalists insist that all religions are equal, they are also saying that no religion is true or saving.)

If you think this has nothing to do with you, you’re wrong. When secularism pushes in the courts, the lawsuits nearly always involve something that happened at a school. When multiculturalism pushes, it nearly always involves the curriculum of schools. If you’re in school, you’re on the front line of this war. Secularism is pushing hard on one side, saying religion doesn’t belong in society. Multiculturalism is pushing hard on the other, saying that every religion, except Christianity, belongs in society. Right in the middle is the pinch. Right in the middle is you.

What are you supposed to do? You’re a Christian, forgiven for Jesus’ sake and seeking to live by God’s Word. You’re also a citizen in the United States, called by God to honor rulers and laws. You’re the innocent bystander in a big fight, and neither side is sympathetic to you and your faith. What are you supposed to do?

For starters, be careful—really careful. When you fight one enemy, you often help another. Take prayer in public schools. You might be tempted, like many Christians, to take up the fight and insist that there must be a class prayer at the start of the day in public schools. Be careful what you wish for. According to the First Amendment, government can’t favor one religion over another. Therefore, if there’s prayer in public schools, it won’t just be prayer to the one true God.There will also be prayers to the Muslim Allah, Vishnu, Buddha, and more. Do you see? If you fight against secularism, you’re helping out multiculturalism. “I don’t want that!” you say. “I don’t want to sit through a bunch of prayers to false gods!” So, you decide, it’s better to have no prayer in school at all. That might be true, but now you’ve just handed a big victory to secularism.

Try another one. Should the old Ten Commandments monument be allowed to stay in the local park? “Absolutely not!” say secularists, and Christians have been fighting in court to keep the commandments in public places. But if one religion has a statue in the park, the First Amendment says that any religion can put one in. Do you want a park with a bunch of statues to all sorts of false gods or room to play Frisbee? Once again, you’re in the middle. If you fight to keep the monument, you’re helping multiculturalism. If you fight to keep all the monuments out, you’re helping secularism. What are you going to do? You’re in the pinch, and you can’t win.

For one thing, don’t panic. This isn’t anything new, but Christians have been through one or the other before with greater stakes. Read up on Polycarp sometime, an early Christian who was told to worship a bunch of false gods or die. Or read up on Christians who lived in Communist countries, instr ucted to deny the existence of God or die. The world is never going to have much use for Jesus.

In fact, give thanks for this: in the United States, you live in a nation that defends your right to worship the one true God. You enjoy a freedom to worship in this land that has never been known before in history. That could change in the future as secularism and multiculturalism continue, but for now though, you’re okay.

More importantly, you don’t have to win the battle. The battle has already been won. “In the world you will have tribulation,” said Jesus to His disciples. “But take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33 ESV). No matter how much people maintain there are no gods or many gods, this truth remains: Christ has overcome the world, conquering sin and death on the cross. Eternal life is yours, because He’s redeemed you to make it so. It’s only a matter of time until He returns in glory to deliver His people to heaven.

In the meantime, live as one redeemed. Be a good citizen wherever you are, and make decisions carefully, doing your best to help your neighbor and influence society as you’re able. If you’re old enough to vote, then vote—even on the local bond issue. Honor your rulers and laws, unless they command you to disobey God. Rejoice to confess the truth, for you can comfort the despairing secularist that there is a God who gives eternal life freely and the confused multiculturalist that there is a Savior who truly raises from the dead.

And always rejoice. The battle is won, for Christ has overcome the world. The pinch will pass, and the kingdom of heaven is yours.

Rev. Tim Pauls is Associate Pastor and Acting School Administrator at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church and School in Boise, Idaho. His email address is tpauls@goodshepherdboise.org.

Prayer in Schools: To Pray or Not to Pray?

By Mollie Ziegler

If you went to a public school fifty years ago, your day probably would have begun with public prayer. Court rulings have taken prayer out of schools, but some Christians fight to bring it back.

God commands prayer throughout the Bible.The right to address God in prayer is a beautiful gift, but did you know Lutherans spoke negatively about prayer in schools as far back as 1870? That’s because in school-led Bible studies and prayers, false doctrine was taught about Jesus. If there were problems then, things haven’t exactly gotten better since.

Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs now attend public schools. In America, everyone has the right to worship as he or she pleases, and we don’t have an official religion. Still, many of our founders were Christian. Politicians mention God in speeches, and God is on our coinage and in the Pledge.

But these statements aren’t reflections of the triune God we worship but a generic god for Americans. Muslims can say the Pledge just as well as we can, but they do not believe in Jesus. So what does it really mean when a politician says,“God bless you”?

If prayer were to be allowed in government schools, it would have to be generic and meaningless or we would be forced to hear false doctrine from other religions.

We may wish that everyone we went to school with worship ed Jesus, but not everyone does. And even if everyone at school claimed to believe in Jesus but taught false things about Him, what kind of prayer would we share?