We are surprised to find that it actually took some Religious Right activist almost a whole day before publicly blaming Monday’s tragic shooting at Chardon High School in Ohio on the lack of school prayer, as what Jerry Newcombe of Truth in Action did in an op-ed for Crosswalk yesterday:
There were never school shootings when prayer was in school. Nothing even remotely like it. But now, for the most part, God has been thrown out of our public schools, and they have had to install the metal detector instead. Even that is not fail-proof … I find it ironic that yesterday’s shooting would occur in the shadow of the 50th anniversary of the infamous school prayer decision. In June 1962, in Engel v. Vitale, the Supreme Court ruled that schools could not officially participate in prayer.
Specifically, the High Court banned this seemingly innocuous prayer: “Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessing upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country.”
…
As long as our schools don’t have a prayer, I suppose some of them need to have a sign installed out in front: Enter at your own risk.
