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4 LIBERTY May/June, 1985
The Year We Hid Our RELIGIOX
BY PAT ARNOW
o my sister and me, transferring to a Virginia high school spelled adventure. We were early teens who had never strayed far from Chicago. In our North Side melting-pot neighborhood we had walked to school or taken city buses on cold days. On our way to Prince George County High School we rode the school bus through a countryside of rolling hills. Classmates and teachers seemed friendlier and more helpful than their Chicago counterparts—though their Southern accents sometimes needed an interpreter. With the innocence of youth we didn't see ourselves as the "foreigners." There was a darker side to our new world, however—one that has shaped my appreciation for separation of church and state—especially in the classroom. Every morning the principal, after reading announcements over the loudspeaker, said a prayer while students dutifully bowed their heads over their desks. The prayer wasn't long. I don't remember the themes. I do remember how the daily ordeal ended. The principal always said, "In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen." I didn't know what to do. As a Jew, I prayed straight to God, not in anyone else's name. To accept the prayer as mine was more of a sin, according to what I had been taught, than not praying at all. My sister and I talked it over. She was as upset about the prayers as I was. But we didn't see a solution. We would have jumped in front of our school bus sooner than ask to be excused. We wouldn't have considered asking that the final phrase be changed to encompass a God that was ours as well as theirs. We could do nothing. We had gone from a public school in Chicago, where more than half the students were Jewish and no religion was the least bit odd, to a school where we were the only non-Christians. We agreed to keep our religion to ourselves. During that year neither of us told a single person that we were Jewish. I don't think we were cowardly. We were simply children. "Jesus Christ our Lord" coming over the loudspeaker every morning didn't leave room for any other belief being normal. It built a wall, with my sister and me standing on the outside. The problem, ultimately, with prayer in public schools is that it excludes some of us. When an authority figure recites prayers the minority become freaks. Parents may argue that their freedom to practice their religion is thus enhanced. But prayer can't be put in the school without restraining the religious freedom of others. Freedom of religion is most important when we find ourselves in the minority, not when we are a confident majority. I didn't know, in 1962, that those daily prayers were part of a national controversy. I thought of school prayer as my personal problem, an unchangeable institution I could do nothing about. By the time the Supreme Court ruled against the practice, my sister and I were back in prayerless Chicago. But I remember hearing about the decision and feeling relieved. No other children would be subjected to the em- barrassment and humiliation that my sister and I had endured. Pat Arnow is a free-lance writer living in Johnson City, Tennessee.
LIBERTY IS PUBLISHED BIMONTHLY AND COPYRIGHTED 0 1985 BY THE REVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING ASSN., 55 WEST OAK RIDGE DRIVE, HAGERSTOWN, MARYLAND 21740. SUBSCRIPTION PRICE: US56.25 PER YEAR. SINGLE COPY: USS1.25. PRICE MAY VARY WHERE NATIONAL CURRENCIES ARE DIFFERENT. VOL. 80. NO. 3. MAY-JUNE, 1985. POSTMASTER: ADDRESS CORRECTION REQUESTED.