I have been reflecting on the issue of freedom to exercise religion. I have been hearing about groups wanting to take prayer out of public schools (including the day of prayer) and taking religious symbols (specifically, the cross) from government property.

I strongly suspect that this drive to take away prayer and religious symbols is an attempt to get the supernatural (i.e. God) out of the public realm. Behind these attempts is the secularist push of the supernatural into the private realm, never to interfere with the public realm. Behind these drive is an aversion to the supernatural  (because of intellectual pride, lifestyle maintenance, negative experiences), especially the Judeo-Christian framework of reality, as manifested in prayer and the christian symbol of the cross. 

The truth is that what a person really believes or values in private will somehow manifest itself in public. A politicial who says he opposes abortion privately but supports abortion rights probably believes that the freedom to choose is the greatest value and should not be subordinated to the right of a human being to live. It is also possible that this politician values power above all and that pandering to one group will give him the power he so values.  

These groups that push for the taking away of prayer and religious symbols usually support their position by saying that the first amendment separates church and state. What the first amendment really does is to assure that one religious group should not have the supremacy and that people should be free to exercise their religion. The concern is that one religious group will be favored by the state. 

I submit that the opponents of prayer and religious symbols are the ones who are violating the first amendment. If a public school teacher wants to lead her students in prayer because she believes in a God who intervenes, she should be allowed to, as long as she does not force her students to do so (students should be allowed not to pray for any reason). To stop her is to violate her freedom to express her faith, and that is the violation of the first amendment.

As far as religious symbols, these symbols are built as an expression of maybe one person or a group of person's religious expression. To tell people that they could not build a religious symbol (e.g. the judge who put up the ten commandments in his courtroom) is a violation of their right to express their faith. Some may object that tax dollars should not be spent on these symbols. However, when we hand our money over the state, we gave it the implicit right to spend however it chooses.

Now to those who oppose the opposers of prayer and religious symbols. The first amendment guarantees the right of everyone to express their faith. Therefore, they have to be open to having teachers in the public school who express, for example, their wiccan faith by teaching students a dance to mother earth or something. They also have to be open to having pentagrams in government buildings.

Is this freedom of religion ideal? No, because it is not glorifying to God. We should use this freedom to protect ourselves from persecution but we should not think of it as the greatest thing in the world. Freedom of religion is a value of this nation and we have to respect that. Should that be changed? Ultimately, every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, that is the goal of history. That would be brought about by the Holy Spirit working in the hearts of people, not by force. The work of the Christian is to pray for the knowledge (relational) of God (Jesus) to fill the earth as the waters cover the sea.