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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 24, 1993                   TAG: 9302240429
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

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PRAYER: RESPITE FROM THE MADNESS

IN RESPONSE to Franklin M. Ridenour's Feb. 2 letter to the editor stressing the usefulness of silent prayer as a tool by which educators may teach thinking:

Thank you for your part in helping to shed some light on the cause of my unrest over the whole fundamental notion of prayer in schools. It has always been obvious as rain to me that schools fall very much short of enlightening their pupils as to the sacredness of life by overemphasizing assimilation and de-emphasizing creativity and self-expression. No need to blame the educational system for this; after all, they are merely trying to prepare our children for life in the real world.

Prayer, then, may be seen as a lovely interruption of the madness in our less-than-spiritual lives. Is it any wonder people are clamoring for their right to these respites of spiritual reaffirmation?

Ridenour suggests that silent prayer is an opportunity for thinking. I am struck by a disturbing picture of a world in which individuals are reduced to beseeching their right to think as a package deal with religious practice. But he makes a good point, nonetheless.

Are thought and prayer one and the same? Oh, if we would but adopt that belief then every thought could be reverently respected as a conversation with God, and every action a transforming impulse in the dance of the spirit. How better to worship one's god than to respect the thoughts and creative energies of every person? How better to cure the social ills than to identify life, from birth to death as a sacred prayer? JULIA WADE BEDFORD

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