Saving Our Children From God.

A great public uproar greeted the Supreme Court’s decision in last year’s school prayer case. The Court, some felt, was making war on religion. Don’t be alarmed, the learned commentators soothed: All the Court has done is to forbid the states to get into the business of composing prayers: we must not suppose it will go further. Two weeks ago the commentators learned a thing or two. In the Schempp case, brought by a Pennsylvania Unitarian, and the Murray case, brought by a Maryland atheist, the Court encountered some prayers that were putatively composed by the Lord Himself. Not the kind of thing that may be heard in a public schoolroom in the United States, said the Supreme Court.

There were new signs of public dismay, but they hardly came to a roar. There was, rather, a kind of bewilderment in the air. How far would the Court go? Though established theology proclaimed otherwise, it seemed doubtful that God knew.

LB

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L. Brent Bozell Jr.

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A great public uproar greeted the Supreme Court’s decision in last year’s school prayer case. The Court, some felt, was making war on religion. Don’t be alarmed, the learned commentators soothed: All the Court has done is to forbid the states to get into the business of composing prayers: we must not suppose it will go further. Two weeks ago the commentators learned a thing or two. In the Schempp case, brought by a Pennsylvania Unitarian, and the Murray case, brought by a Maryland atheist, the Court encountered some prayers that were putatively composed by the Lord Himself. Not the kind of thing that may be heard in a public schoolroom in the United States, said the Supreme Court.

There were new signs of public dismay, but they hardly came to a roar. There was, rather, a kind of bewilderment in the air. How far would the Court go? Though established theology proclaimed otherwise, it seemed doubtful that God knew.