Religion and School

The issue of Church and State separation is one that includes many sub-topics within this large topic. One such issue is the controversy over religion and school. When prayer was banned from public schools, there was a lot of people that were happy about the decision, but on the other hand, there were many people that was upset about the decision. What many people don't know about the decision however, is that prayer is not banned from school, but state-enforced prayer is. Even with this fact, some still believe that religious references do not belong in schools. This is largely due to the increasing diversity of America. As more and more immigrants come, the number of religions besides Christianity is going to increase. On the opposite side, are those who believe that taking prayer out of public schools was a mistake. Those on this side are largely Christians, if not all.

In my opinion, I don't believe that prayer should be forced in public schools, that's why there are private schools. In public schools, people are from diverse backgrounds with many different religious beliefs, and some may not have any beliefs. With this fact, I don't believe that if you are not of the Christian faith, you shouldn't be forced to say a prayer to a God you may not believe in. However, I don't believe that all religious references should be taken out of school. I think that it is necessary to teach such things in schools because it's always good to have knowledge about different things besides your own culture. In brief, religion isn't something that should be "shoved down someones throat", but it should be acknowledged in all public schools.