Most Americans favor school prayer
- Joanne Jacobs
- Jun 27
- 2 min read
Fifty-seven percent of Americans favor teacher-led prayer in school, and 52 percent want teachers to lead prayers that mention Jesus, according to a new Pew survey, reports Chris Rotolo.
A new Texas law requires public schools to post the Ten Commandments in classrooms, allegedly as a historical reference. Parents have filed suit. A federal appeals court struck down a similar law in Louisiana earlier this month.
Support for Christian prayer is very high in the South -- 81 percent in Mississippi -- and above 50 percent in most prairie and Midwest states.
In West Coast and New England states, most people lean the other way on teacher-led Christian prayer: Oregon (65%) and Vermont (64%) are the most opposed, next to the District of Columbia at 69 percent.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against official prayer in school in 1962. People may want it, but it's not going to happen. (Students can pray silently before math tests.)
I'm also fairly sure that the Ten Commandments' laws will not stand up. It's one thing to have children learn about the Ten Commandments as they study our culture, literature and history. It's another to post them in the classroom.
I learned about the Commandments in religious school. The teacher had to explain that "adultery" doesn't mean acting like an adult. Someone noticed we weren't supposed to covet our neighbor's ass. It was a moment of joy for us, though perhaps not for the teacher.
Progressives should take note, writes Neal McCluskey. "People holding conservative values might well be a majority." If you want a school that reflects your values -- yes on pride flags, no on the Ten Commandments (or quotations from Art of the Deal) -- you should support school choice. "Money should follow children to chosen educational arrangements rather than government collecting tax dollars and sending them all to its schools."
"People tend to gravitate to places with folks similar to them," he adds, so "federalism helps more people get education they want and avoid what they do not."
As someone who remembers the previous fights over school prayer, the fights were over who controlled what was going to be said in the prayer. Anecdotally, the Catholics were always mad that the in school prayers were always Protestant Baptist in theology and wording.