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We should not permit prayer to be taken out of the schools; that's the only way most of us got through.

With that in mind and in celebration of National Prayer Day, today I have proposed in the House of Representatives a Constitutional Amendment that would restore voluntary prayer in our Nation's schools.

In America our public schools are intended to be religiously neutral. Our teachers and schools are neither to endorse nor to inhibit religion. I believe this is a very good thing.

I agree with the idea that there is a separation of church and state. That teachers should not be leading prayer - a particular kind of prayer in classrooms.

The right wing always mobilizes around constitutional amendments: the right to bear arms, school prayer.

We don't need mandatory, non-sectarian prayers read over the loudspeaker to 'put God back in schools.' God never left the schools. God is still at work through the hundreds of thousands of gifted teachers and administrators, committed parents, and passionate volunteers who seek to help give our children 'a future with hope.'

This issue is whether or not our government should be infusing religion into (schools).

Our public schools began as ministries of the church; now it is time to return them to the Lord.

Before this government came to power, many failing schools were simply allowed to drift on in a pattern of continuing failure. The government is determined to break that pattern and is successfully doing so.

It seems that the right of freedom of speech that was enshrined in numerous constitutions is now under attack by religious institutions.