Return Prayer to Schools?

Someone sent a petition my way to "return prayer to schools." Here's what I wrote:


There's plenty of prayer in school - teachers pray, and so do students and their families. We don't need "organized" prayer - who's to write it, say it, and what will it be? Generic prayers to some space-deity? Patriotic prayers? A Muslim prayer? A Jewish prayer? Pentecostal prayer, in tongues? A justice-prayer by a justice-seeking Christian? We have more than enough prayer in our schools. What we don't have is adequate funding, because, for some strange reason, we lack the will to care for all the children. I pray that we will decide again that all our children are really important, and decide to fund American education as it once was funded, fully, for all the arts and sciences, building maintenance, decent salaries and benefits, and all the needed supplies, with adequate social support - jobs and living wages, health-care and bringing our soldiers home. These are things we can do, and they would mean the world to our children.

Term Limits

I'm not in favor of term limits because it circumvents the responsibility of the voter, and also prevents the formation of great leaders, like Everett Dirksen (GOP) or Teddy Kennedy (Dem) who served long and distinguished careers for the sake of our Democracy.

Term limits allow too many wet-behind-the-ears youngsters to get in, collect a salary, act brashly, or not act at all, and then go home with a pension. The power of voting remains the key, and an intelligent electorate remains the challenge.