American public schools today are not the same as in my youth, primarily due to the fact our own government, school boards, school administrators, and many teachers have gradually made every attempt possible to eliminate God from our schools over the past fifty plus years. May God bless those school teachers, officials and staff who do not check their Christian faith at the public school doors in America here in the 21st century.
It’s a very disappointing trend how our government, many of our school officials and teachers have so easily allowed themselves to be deceived by Satan—in helping to remove everything possible regarding God and Christianity—from our public schools. It pleases Satan to prevent godly and Christian principles from ever reaching our public school students. Satan knows if he can do two things, control the minds of our top governmental leaders and at the same time control the education of our children, then he can dismantle and destroy a predominantly Christian nation with greater ease.
Today it is so very obvious, virtually everywhere you look, how our American culture and society is paying a regretfully high price for the purposeful neglect of Christian principles from being included in our public schools. It’s sad to say this is being done by the very people we entrust with educating our youth at all age levels in schools across our country.
American schools had a godly heritage for nearly two centuries until the U.S. Supreme Court in 1962 ruled that school prayer was unconstitutional, because the Engel vs. Vitale court case that year redefined the word “church” as meaning ‘a religious activity in public’ for the first time in America’s history, and not just a “federally established denomination” as it had always previously been defined.
School prayer was the first casualty of the redefinition of the First Amendment, but in 1963 two additional Supreme Court cases ruled that Bible reading, religious classes, and religious instruction in public schools were unconstitutional. All this at a time in the early 1960’s when 97 percent of Americans still stated a belief in God, and only 3 percent professed no belief in religion or God.
It seems that only Satan could twist and deceive the minds of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices at that time in the early 1960’s to rewrite the First Amendment of the Constitution in favor of only 3 percent of the American population. It’s not hard to see, by studying our national statistics, that our nation’s morality has been on a steady slide since that time.
Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars. Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. —President George Washington
We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” —President John Adams
“Do not be deceived: bad company corrupts good morals. Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God” (1 Corinthians 15:33-34).
It is a sorry state of educational affairs today, that a large percentage of our public school students have no knowledge of God, and the resulting morality decline in our culture and society is the direct fault of all the adults in responsible positions of educating our youth.
During my years in the public school system, my generation of students recited the Pledge of Allegiance, with “under God” included, each day before classes began, and doing so seemed as natural to us as studying our lessons and any other daily school activities.
In elementary school our music period would find the smaller kids climbing onto the laps of the bigger kids at their desks and selecting songs to sing from our old yellow soft cover music books. We would sing not only fun secular songs, but also gospel songs, religious Christmas songs, and even some old Christian hymns once in awhile. Those spontaneous songfests provided learning and laughter, and enough good memories to last until today.
At Christmas time our school kids would put on Christmas (not “Holiday”) programs in the school house for parents, friends, and local residents. The students would sing not only secular, but religious Christmas songs, and participate in skits containing both secular and religious content. Incorporating a little religious content into a school activity back then came as naturally as eating, sleeping and breathing. We never thought anything about it.
Sometimes during the Christmas season the students would organize as a group to go “caroling” around town with our teachers and classmates. We would sing secular and religious Christmas carols to mostly the older housebound residents in our attempt to share some Christmas ’comfort and joy’ at their front doors, and not once did we ever have someone slam the door in our faces because we sang a religious Christmas song to them, but we often did bring smiles and sometimes tears to their faces with our singing.
In high school, during study hall period, I would read the Bible we had on the school library shelf. My study hall teacher did not stop me from reading it, but actually praised me for reading the Bible in school, and stated her desire for more students to do the same.
Also, in high school, our music groups often sang religious songs for district and state competitions. We scored multiple superior ratings when we sang songs with wording such as “Climbing up the mountain children, oh Lord, I didn’t come here for to stay, oh brother if I never more see you again, gonna meet you at the judgment day. Daniel in the den of lions, he did begin to pray, and the Angel of the Lord shut the lion’s jaw, that sure was a mighty day.”
Or verses like “Rejoice in the Lord, always, and again I say rejoice.” And when it came time for graduation in our public school the staff and students were free to deliver verbal prayers during Baccalaureate and Commencement services. It seemed to be a fitting way to conclude 13 years of public school by thanking God in prayer for His blessings through our school years and asking for His guidance in the coming years of life.
American public schools, with God excluded, are incomplete institutions. Imagine schools trying to function properly without such things as buses, libraries, computers, sports, play- ground equipment, cafeterias, certified teachers, qualified coaches, achievement recognition, and graduation diplomas. So why do we think we can operate our public schools without God anymore than operating schools without the above listed integral and essential functions and items needed for running a well-rounded, successful school today?
The saddest, most disturbing and tragic aspect of all is that when American public schools do not allow God in their curriculums and activities, the schools and students are far worse off than without all of the above fundamental school related examples combined.
The reason the exclusion of God from schools is so devastating to our culture and society is because there is absolutely no way to graduate students from public schools with a solid, well-rounded education and a firm foundation to prepare them for adult life, without including Christianity based moral precepts into their school life.
We must allow Godly principles back into the education process of American schools for the future sake of our youth and our country!
Could inviting God back into public schools help prevent the mass school shootings and stabbings we have way too often these days? I believe so. What do you honestly think?
“Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22: 6)
I have not forgotten the Christian-based training I received in my youth from my parents, Sunday School teachers, and yes, even some of my public school teachers. The Christian principles they instilled in me have stuck with me as I have grown older.
I praise God for all the people who loved me enough to train me properly during my upbringing years, by incorporating good moral training based on Christian principles, not only at home but also during all 13 years of my public schooling. I cannot imagine being trained any other way in my youth, and being able to deal properly with all the stresses and sinfulness we face in the world we live in today.
In this election year please remember that elections have either good or bad consequences. Make your vote count and help to restore God and Christian principles in our government and public schools ASAP! There is no better time to begin this process of once again improving our government and schools than with our votes for elected officials who have a track record of good moral, Christian precepts in their previous actions and conduct.