Us & Them: The Church Lady

Are America’s schools hostile to religion? There’s been a tussle over this issue since the early 60s, when the Supreme Court ruled that prayer and school-sponsored Bible reading were unconstitutional. Since then, evangelical Christians have claimed that God and religion have all but been driven out of education and secular Americans, concerned about blurring the wall between church and state, have been vigilant over any erosion of that separation. The fact is religion has been a part of America’s classrooms ever since there were public schools. And before the court weighed in, some public schools welcomed preachers and priests and even rabbis into classrooms. They called it Weekday Religious Education. And here’s a surprise… a version of Weekday Religious Education is still going on today.