Bible Reading in Public Schools
By Editor
“MAKE it the first morning business of your life to understand some portion of the Bible clearly, and your daily business to obey it in all you do understand.” WE quite agree with the Kansas supreme court on one point of the following decision recently made by that body, sustaining the practise of Bible reading and prayer in the public schools:— A public school teacher who, for the purpose of quieting the pupils and preparing them for their regular studies, repeats the Lord's prayer and the twenty-third Psalm, as a morning exercise, without comment or remarks, in which none of the pupils are required to participate, is not conducting a form of religious worship, or teaching sectarian or religious doctrines. [Italics ours.] We agree that such an exercise, for the purpose specified, could not properly be called religious worship. This judicial pronouncement well illustrates the natural incapacity of courts or departments of the civil government to deal with matters of religion. The cause of Christianity was never advanced by court decisions.