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PRAYER IN SCHOOLS An eye-opening book to read (assuming you CAN read after nine decades of “progressive education”) is a book titled, America: To Pray or Not to Pray? by David Barton. Barton states that in July 1987, God led him to take a closer look at what has happened to America since this simple twenty-two word school prayer was ruled unlawful by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1962: Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers, and our Country. This “dangerous” prayer posed such a “threat” to liberty that it was forbidden from our schools in the 1962 Engel versus Vitale case. Barton and his co-workers researched thousands of articles and documents relating to the four specific requests made in the prayer: God’s blessings upon (1) us, (2) our parents, (3) our teachers, and (4) our Country. As Barton well states, the results of that search are both “clear and shocking.” Under the “us” category, Barton found that the birth rate for unwed girls between fifteen and nineteen years of age had climbed only moderately in the 1950’s, and the rate had actually decreased just prior to 1962. However, after the Supreme Court threw “Thy blessings upon us” out of the schools in 1962, the birth rate for unwed girls in this age bracket began to climb. The rate in 1951 was about 13 births per 1,000 girls. In 1955, the rate climbed to about 16 and stayed there until 1961 when it actually started going down. The Supreme Court decision came in 1962, and then the rate started climbing: 16 in 1965, 17.5 in 1967, 22.5 in 1971, 25 in 1979, 27 in 1983, 32 in 1987, and nearly 45 in 1993. That’s about a 300 percent increase since the ruling. Along with this increase came an increase in pregnancies among girls under fifteen years of age (5,000 in 1963; 20,000 in 1971; 25,000 in 1979), a 400 percent increase in gonorrhea cases in the 10-14 age group between 1962 and 1988, and a 1,000 percent increase in fornication activity among fifteen year olds between 1962 and 1988. Other charts show a tremendous increase in rape arrests, aggravated assaults, and murder (from about 35 per 100,000 in 1965 to over 140 per 100,000 in 1991). Some increase in the figures would be expected due to population growth, but when looking at charts showing the figures from the fifties through the eighties, it is very clear that the early 1960’s were a drastic turning point, and that’s when “Thy blessings upon us” were forbidden in the schools. “Thy blessings upon . . . our parents” was the next category of Barton’s study. He learned that divorce rates had decreased in the 1950’s and then leveled off between 1957 and 1962. Then, after “Thy blessings upon . . . our parents” was thrown out of the schools, the divorce rate began to climb. In fact, it doubled over the next ten years. The early 1960’s also proved to be a turning point for unmarried couples living together, single parent households and also adultery. Another “curse” that has fallen upon parents is the curse of denial. Research has shown that today’s American parents are far too satisfied with the performance of their kids in high school and with the schools themselves. Over two thirds of the parents surveyed have said that they are satisfied that their kids were well prepared for the job market. However, employers had a different story to tell. Less than thirty percent of employers said that their newly hired graduates had sufficient math, writing, and reading skills.[15] That’s a gap of over a thirty-five percent difference between what parents are comfortable with and with what employers expect, and the gap is even larger with parents of college-bound students. The problem isn’t likely to be fixed when parents are too blind to even see it. Barton’s category on “our teachers” shows a downward turn in American education in general. SAT scores, both total and verbal, took a nose dive after the 1962 ruling, and school expenditures (dollars per student) would increase by over 1,000 percent by 1990. A growing number of teachers are also falling short in meeting the true qualifications for their teaching positions. The fourth category, “Thy blessings upon . . . our Country” also offers some staggering numbers. Between 1951 and 1962 there was an average of around 200,000 violent crimes committed annually in the United States. During the two years following the Supreme Court ruling banning prayer in schools, that number rose to over 300,000, and by the end of the 1960’s the number had reached about 700,000. By 1980, it had climbed to over 1,000,000, and it was pushing 2,000,000 in 1993. That’s nearly a 1,000 percent increase since the Supreme Court ruling in 1962, yet population growth has experienced only about a fifty percent increase in the same time period. Sexually transmitted diseases have skyrocketed since 1962, costing Americans over $2,000,000,000 annually in health care expense. Alcohol abuse is up, wrecking our families, claiming 100,000 lives per year, and costing us over $100,000,000,000 annually in financial loss. Barton states that forty-five percent of our male students are heavy drinkers and twenty-five percent of our female students drink heavily. About 23,000,000 Americans have problems with alcohol. Also in this fourth category, national productivity has decreased since the early 1960’s (while our national debt has only increased). Compared to eleven other manufacturing nations, the United States has experienced the largest production decline over the past four decades. The Humanists, Socialists and Communists took over the schools in the first half of the twentieth century, and they threw God out in the second half. Consequently, their educational system has “evolved” into a jungle system.