I belong to a listserve that connects present students and graduates of the healing school I attended. This connection is dynamic and wonderful, and I’ve both given and received support through it. People post stuff, and it circulates among us; it’s often as thought-provoking as it is supportive.
Recently one of the healers posted a speech that was supposedly from a father whose daughter died in the Columbine shooting. This father urged that prayer be re-instated in school. Here is the response I posted on the listserve.
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Dear Fellow Healer:
Thank you for posting this passionate speech for us to read.
While I certainly do regret the moral relativism and spiritual desiccation of our current culture, I for one am very glad that my three children do not have to pray in school. I am a deeply spiritual person who prays several times a day. I have encouraged my children to form personal relationships with the Divine, and to pray regularly, since they were toddlers. I am doing that all over again with my 3 year old.
However, I most explicitly do not want my children praying in a state-sponsored way in their school. The notion of folded hands, bent head, and silent prayer is a Christian one, and I am a Jew. Jews davven. We stand and rock and chant when we pray. That is not the only way we pray, but it is at the heart of what makes us Jews, and what differentiates us from other religions. I do not want my children to pray as Christians because they are not Christians. Mandating state-sponsored prayer in school is not a way to create unity, but a way to intensify feelings of alienation in people who do not belong to the prevailing religion, which is Christianity.
It is my understanding that Muslims pray by kneeling on a prayer rug. I took a year of Arabic in college and this is what was taught to me at that time.
I have a keen understanding of the differences between Christianity and Judaism because I was born and raised Christian and converted to Judaism as a matter of choice. I have made a profound, lifelong study of religions–and their historical excesses, prejudices, and intolerances–and it has helped me to be very, very grateful for the extent to which religion is kept out of secular institutions such as schools in America.
I do not believe that praying in school could have prevented the shootings at Columbine. To my mind, that is a fantasy with which a bereaved father is comforting himself: “If only….”
It would perhaps be useful in schools for students to begin each day with a moment of centering themselves and considering what their purpose is for that day. Even with that broad a definition, I have serious concerns about individual teachers hijacking that moment to press their personal religious agendas.
But thank you again for posting this; it gave me much food for thought.
Traci L. Slatton
I’m not a great believer in school prayer either although I think if someone wants to pray they should. The notion that kneeling and folding the hands is a Christian one is not really true. You’re identifying Chritianity by white Christians alone. That’s okay because most Americans don’t really think of non-European cultures when they make generalizations. They tend to assume that the European way is the definitive way. Certainly in churches with my fellow African-American we don’t sit around kneeling. And neither do we fold our hands. I also attend Hispanic evangelical churches and they don’t do that either. Nor do African churches, or in Chinese churches, or in Native American churches or churches in the world christian indigenous community. So it’s not really part of the Christian religion worldwide. On the day of pentecost, people were standing sitting or whatever…not in any particular position. And in the psalms people dance and sing and clap their hands and shout. Not arguing …just saying that your definition of Christianity seems to be limited by A) your PAST experience….especially when you’re discussing a culture you ONCE believed in.
and B) your culture. The Past moves into the present. So it’s not a good idea to believe that if one has left a place in the past that that place remains as you saw it. And it’s also a good idea to realize that your culture’s expression of a religion is only that…your culture’s definition. As I said, I know white people don’t really consider what other cultures do to be important…but…we non-whites consider our cultures important. Especially since Non-white evangelicals are the largest Christian “culture” throughout the world. So, best to watch the generalizations about another group’s religion.
I don’t think the shooting at columbine could’ve been stopped by school prayer. It has been reported that several days before the shooting a minister of one of the boys received a spiritual insight that someone in the congregation was contemplating suicide and murder. He stopped the service and pleaded with whoever-it-was to renounce his plans. That went on for 45 minutes or so and the kid didn’t stand up. Heck, if God tells your minister to warn you and you don’t listen…no amount of church prayer would’ve helped.
Oh gee…one more thought.
Intolerance exists despite religion. In our century, most of the oppression has been done by non-religious people. If we are so upset about oppression, we should also include the oppression caused by atheist regimes such as Ma Tse Tung’s oppression and Stalin’s oppression.
Hitler killed 6 million Jews and although he wasn’t religious he used Christianity as an excuse. He also killed 5 millioin gypsies and he didn’t use Christianity as an excuse to kill them. He used eugenics. (science) So is this religious oppression or a merely evil person using whatever tools he could to destroy folks he didn’t like?
Oppression can be defined as cruelty caused by 1) one religion against another, 2) cruelty caused by a state against a religion, 3) cruelty caused by Christianity (or any religion you hate) against any other religion, 4) oppression caused by folks in a religion against other folks in that same religion because of cultural history (such as the Dalits in India who although Hindu are oppressed by other Hindus). From your post I think you have to define Oppression in a more succinct and clear way. Tossing off a generality only feeds into folks’ preconception about religions and history in general and Christianity specifically.
State oppression against religion still exists, especially against Christians in countries such as China, Indonesia, and India. Christians not being allowed to pray in school may or may not be oppression. But it doesn’t compare to the kind of suffering Christians suffer in those countries….at the hand of local, state-sponsored, or religious oppressors.