A PLACE FOR PRAYER

The courts may have outlawed prayer in schools, but it hasn't stopped young people from praying. It also hasn't dimmed young enthusiasm to emphasize the importance of Christian values both at school and home.

Wednesday was "See You at the Pole" day, a national event for students. High school students in Cape Girardeau, Scott City, Jackson and other districts quietly gathered around the flag poles and prayed for their schools, administrators, family and nation.

This annual prayer service gives students a chance to gather on school property during non-school hours. The gathering in Cape Girardeau took place at 7 a.m., as not to evoke legal questions. Adults also got into the swing at the Common Pleas Courthouse.

Another group of junior high, senior high and college students rallied around the pole Tuesday evening at Bethel Assembly, sponsored by the citywide Youth Pastor Alliance.

This marked the third year local students have participated in this national observance. The impetus was a local prayer meeting of several high school students in the spring of 1990. It spread through youth leadership conferences and an estimated 1 million students took part in the first national day of student-led prayer in 1991.

Since that time, the observance has extended to Singapore, Canada, the Philippines, Guatemala, Taiwan, Russia, Austria, Albania, Romania, Belgium, the Bahamas and elsewhere.

The flag poles have become a visual rallying point for prayer across the globe.

It is a shame that students with religious convictions have been forced out of the schools to share their beliefs. Too often in today's society, wholesale changes are made to accommodate the concerns of a few. Whatever happened to majority rules?

Most people in this area feel it is nonsense that a generic prayer can't be said at a graduation ceremony or that baccalaureates must be moved off school grounds. These are important traditions to the majority of people.

Some of these students who gathered at the flag pole have been meeting as a Christian club and support group known as Truth. It is heartening to see young people speaking out for such positive values.

There has been a Christian rebirth across the country, due in part to the upward spiral of crime and violence. Why should guns and drugs be more commonplace in our urban schools that prayer and kind deeds?

People offended by Christian sensibilities don't go so far as to toss away U.S. coinage, which bears the words "In God We Trust." Even the sessions of Congress still open with a prayer. Our schools should be no different. Common sense must return in the treatment of Christian values in public education and the workplace.