The following letter to the editor [as edited] appeared in the
Tuesday, May 2, edition of "USA TODAY":


RELIGION HAS NO PLACE IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS

     It is disingenuous of USA TODAY to deliberately confuse its
readers concerned with prayer in the schools with Jay Sekulow in
his presentation of a need for a religious liberty amendment to
the Constitution ("Stop the discrimination," Opposing View,
Debate, Thursday).

     All of the nation's politicians and religious organizations
agree that a constitutional amendment is the only way to put
prayer into the schools. The Christian Coalition has cleverly
substituted the idea of a religious equality amendment, which
Sekulow carefully avoids defining. This is calculated to enforce
the intrusion of majoritarian (i.e., Christian) religion in all
aspects of American public life.

     American Atheists insists that religion is or ought to be a
private matter and cannot and should not be accepted in the
public arena as representing rational thinking.

     Fantasy thinking needs to be contained within the bounds of
the imagination of whose who conjure up religious suppositions.
THere is no place for such thinking in the marketplace of
reasonable ideas or in the public schools of our time.


Jon G. Murray, president
American Atheists, Inc.
Austin, TX


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