Opinions Not Welcome

Tuesday, November 30, 2004

Tommy Craft, a high school principal in Athens, Georgia, said he meant to provoke thought when he read a poem called "The New School Prayer" over the school's intercom last Tuesday before Thanksgiving break. As a result, some parents have complained saying he violated the principle of separation of church and state.

"The New School Prayer," which is not a prayer, points out the irony that exists in the public school system which calls for the distribution of condoms but shuns religion. Mr. Craft will most likely be chastised by the local school board for having the audacity to ask his students to think about something. I mean, it is a school...you know, a place for learning and thinking.

So not only is voluntary, non-religious specific prayer forbidden in school, but so is the pro-position of it. Here is the partial text from the prayer you can easily find online:

Now I sit me down in school
Where praying is against the rule
For this great nation under God
Finds mention of Him very odd.

If Scripture now the class recites,
It violates the Bill of Rights.
And anytime my head I bow
Becomes a Federal matter now.

We're allowed to cuss and dress like freaks,
And pierce our noses, tongues and cheeks.
They've outlawed guns, but FIRST the Bible.
To quote the Good Book makes me liable.

We can get our condoms and birth controls,
Study witchcraft, vampires and totem poles.
But the Ten Commandments are not allowed,
No word of God must reach this crowd.

It's scary here I must confess,
When chaos reigns the school's a mess.
So, Lord, this silent plea I make:
Should I be shot; My soul please take!

Amen