An evangelical Christian wrote a letter to the editor of WorldNetDaily.com describing exactly why prayer at a high school football game is a bad idea. His opinion of religious beliefs contrary to his own is not a generous or charitable one, but he now understands the alienation that can occur when one is subjected to the beliefs of others in a public environment where the community’s welfare should be the top concern…
He was prompted to comment after reading about a New Jersey football coach who resigned (but has since rejoined the team) because he was prohibited from leading his team in pre-game prayers.
I am an evangelical Christian and you might be surprised then to learn that I am adamantly opposed to teachers and other school officials leading students in prayer or the conduct of prayer rituals, even by students, at officially sanctioned events. Why would I take a position that is seemingly so at odds with my core beliefs? …
He found out what it was like being in a religious minority while living in Hawaii where the predominance of believers were of the Buddhist or Shinto faiths. He walked a mile in someone else’s shoes when he was forced to listen to their prayers at a public event.
To read the rest of the letter, click here (Thanks to GNN member Tristan Arts for submitting the article)
The wisest of our country’s founders had it right:
I am for freedom of religion and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendancy of one sect over another. It behoves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others; or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own. – Thomas Jefferson
Government being, among other purposes, instituted to protect the consciences of men from oppression, it is certainly the duty of Rulers, not only to abstain from it themselves, but according to their stations, to prevent it in others. – George Washington, in a letter to the Religious Society called the Quakers
Whilst we assert for ourselves a freedom to embrace, to profess and observe the Religion which we believe to be of divine origin, we cannot deny equal freedom to those whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence which has convinced us. If this freedom be abused, it is an offense against God, not against man: To God, therefore, not to man, must an account of it be rendered. – James Madison