Engel v. Vitale

June 25th of next year will mark the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision of to remove prayer from school in Engel v. Vitale (370 U.S. 421). Looking back on the history of our nation, this court decision in 1962 marks a clear turning point in our culture. Lots of people ask me about the importance of prayer in school. What are the effects? What is its significance to us today? History is perhaps the best teacher...

The issues surrounding the establishment of school-sanctioned and facilitated prayer in school centralize around the First Amendment religious freedoms given to students. A public school district in New York recited a simple, voluntary, nondenominational prayer each morning before school reading, "Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country. Amen."

The issue came when a group of parents contested the prayer as unconstitutional on the grounds that the government cannot establish a religion based on the belief system of the majority - that this prayer imposed on their freedom of religion as atheists and non-believers. while the validity of their case was largely debated and ultimately favored, student-led prayer remained possible.

This court decision actually did much more than many people realized. There is something significant about how the laws of the land act as a statement before heaven, and heaven sees the laws and grieves the gradual decay of the generation.

Where the story really begins to unfold is in the years immediately following this decision. Once this decision was made, and the legal principal was established, everything changed. The removal of prayer from school was the decision that served as the tipping point for countless other cases. Soon after 1962, other decision were made further removing God from our schools, including the removal of the ten commandments from display in public schools.

Not only were more court decision made, but the youth culture drastically changed. Starting in 1963, there was a rapid acceleration in the rate of teen violence cases, teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections among teens, and even the family unite in America began to decay more rapidly as national divorce rates actually began to rise. Academics also showed signs of change. The steady national average SAT score fell sharply between 1963 and 1964 and national academics also began to decline. 

In short, there was a clear shift in the history of America related to the removal of prayer from schools. This raises the question, if the removal of prayer can have such  drastic negative effect on our youth, what could the return of prayer (through student-led gatherings) accomplish in our nation? Could we see the divorce rate recover? Could we see teen pregnancy recover? Could we see teen drug use and violence begin to fall? Could we even see national test scores begin to rise?

More than any of that, could we begin to see the ever growing percentage of unsaved teens begin to receive salvation and exalt Jesus? It is said that over 80% of people who get saved do so before the age of 18, and over 80% of those fall away in college. At this rate, less than 4% of this young generation are actually showing solid church involvement, and less than 1/2 of a percent actually have a clear Biblical worldview. An entire generation is going to hell on our watch, youth ministry in America is broken, but what if the prayers of the saints turned heaven's gaze as in 2 Chronicles 7:14:

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

What if?

As Supreme Court Justice Stewart dissented, 

I think that to deny the wish of these school children to join in reciting this prayer is to deny them the opportunity of sharing in the spiritual heritage of our Nation. (http://vftonline.org/EndTheWall/Engel-Stewart.htm)