Religious Groups Join Coalition to Fight School Prayer Amendment

A broad coalition of religious groups is vowing to fight any efforts to amend the Constitution to allow prayer in public schools.

In front of the Supreme Court, where school prayer was declared unconstitutional, and across the street from the Capital, where Republican leaders have promised a vote on a school prayer amendment by July 4, 18 organizations came together to voice “unequivocal opposition to a school prayer amendment.”

“We are very much in favor of prayer and that’s precisely why we’re opposed to an amendment,” said Brent Walker, general council of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs.

The coalition includes Reconstructionist, Reform, Conservative and Orthodox Jewish groups as well as representatives from the Baptist, Lutheran, Presbyterian and Methodist communities.

Jewish defense organizations including the Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee and American Jewish Congress played an instrumental role in organizing the coalition.

The National Council of Jewish Women and the National Jewish Democratic Council also signed onto the coalition.

“We believe it is our educators and synagogue members who can best convey our religion,” said Nina Shanker, staff counsel of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.

“The government’s role it to foster respect and tolerance for religious beliefs,” Shanker said, “not to intervene in prayer.”

Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, agreed, saying that a school prayer amendment is “unnecessary, unjustified and unwise.”

When Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) threatens “to tamper for the first time in our 205-year history with the Bill of Rights, it sends shivers of fear to all who cherish those rights.”

Gingrich, slated to be the next Speaker of the House, has promised to introduce a school prayer amendment before July 4.

Not all Jewish organizations joined the coalition.

The fervently Orthodox Agudath Israel has deferred a decision on whether to sign onto the effort until its five-member Council of Sages re-evaluates the group’s position in light of the renewed debate.

“There’s now an opportunity for the rabbis to revisit this issue,” said Abba Cohen, Washington director of Agudath Israel. The organization in the past opposed a constitutional amendment, but has not ruled out supporting prayer in schools “if there are iron-clad safeguards built in to ensure non-coercion and non-denominational prayer.”

The group is expected to decide its position in the coming weeks.

The coalition members are in the process of planning lobbying strategies, and have already begun to educate their constituents across the country about the battle against a school prayer amendment.

While all the organizations at the news conference were united in opposing a constitutional amendment, some of the non-Jewish groups said they favored a moment of silence in the nation’s classrooms.

However when asked if anyone supported congressional legislation on a moment of silence, no one stepped forward.