Saying prayers in Public schools a good thing or a bad thing?

I hate the pledge and "Moment of Silence". I have no problem with respecting my country but people go ballisitic if you decide not to do it one day. And the latter is an excuse for praying where I live (Texas). Just get rid of it, it wastes time.

They actually made it law here in Illinois that in high school you're required to say the pledge everyday...total BS, I think. I NEVER once said it in the two years I was in high school after that law was made. Why? Because mindlessly repeating words doesn't make you patriotic, it makes you a mindless drone.

This "moment of silence" at the end of a class thing is crap, too. Why waste a minute or two to "calm the kids down" when it could be used productively to finish up a lesson or answer questions?

Prayer has no place in a public school. If you want to pray, do it before or after school, or during lunch or between classes. Don't make everyone else waste their class time while you pray.

Thats interesting. We have nothing like that in Australia, although theoretically I have no problem of prayer in schools, except if its forced on those that don't wish to.

here, in catholic schools, there are barely any prayers anymore... a good thing luckily... but to get those conservative americans to chance their ways you need more than just patience

Chance their ways? What do you need then? And will it work on the conservatives in Europe, as well?

I don't mind the pledge. Here you aren't required to say it by law but they expect you to at least shut up during it.... which a lot of people don't anyways. Most people just stand up and don't say anything... that's what I do. I don't think it makes me a mindless drone I think it makes me respectful.

I'm not going to say that I'm against praying in public schools. But seriously it all depends. If you strongly believe in God, then yes it's fine for you to pray, but no one has the right to force you into praying if you don't believe.

no one has the right either to tell that they can go spend time DURING class for praying! certainly not in a public school

Originally posted by Cipher
Chance their ways? What do you need then? And will it work on the conservatives in Europe, as well?

I don't mind if kids pray on there own terms... how are you gonna stop them? You can't tell them not to pray.. but I just don't see the need for a certain time that pray will be allowed. Let them pray whenever they want as long as they do it in their head.

its a moment of silence lol not prayer time

Why do we need a moment of silence then if not for prayer?

it calms kids down for starters.

So they should have a mandatory moment of silence for the whole school to "calm kids down?" I don't think so. Each teacher should be in charge of when their students are/aren't allowed to talk, so they can "calm them down" whenever they want. Besides, a moment of silence doesn't really calm people down.. just pauses their conversations. Like I said.. the pledge never calms people down in any of my classes.

You can say it's to calm kids down all you want, if it wasn't for a lack of prayer in public schools this "moment of silence" wouldn't even be an issue.

who said the pledge calmed people down?
If there's ever been a need for calming down kids in our schools systems, now is the time. There's more violence, school shootings.... and how exactly is a moment of silence hurting anyone?

It's not.. but it sure as hell isn't going to stop school shootings. Just because it wont hurt anyone doesn't make it a good thing. I feel it's just pointless and so far I haven't seen a single reason why it's necessary. And nobody said the pledge calmed people down but that's basically the same thing.. stop talking for 30 seconds (or say the pledge.) If that doesn't calm kids down, why would a moment of silence? And we have had moments of silence in school... we had one a few weeks ago but we only have them when a tragedy occurs.. having them everyday is just pointless.

Originally posted by Fiery Eyes
its a moment of silence lol not prayer time

you need to silence kids down at the END of a lesson? why? a minute or two later they have a break of something so they won't be silent there...
a teacher has to spend his/her time wisely, as silver said, by answering questions, going over a difficult thing one more time etc.
NOT losing time by giving "silent time" which is just the same as praying-time no matter how you turn it. It is called that cause if it was called praying, it would be illegal

I wonder what the kids think about during "silent time?"

Originally posted by finti
thats what personal matter means, noone can deny someone to pray inside of them, out load though is a total different matter alltogether

You can't deny such a thing, but you can't lawfully impose it, either. That's all I meant.

Originally posted by Imperial_Samura
I wonder what the kids think about during "silent time?"

I talk. **** silent time. Its only purpose is for prayer, anyone can see that.

In my school we had a moment of silence when one of the students died.