Apparently (http://tinyurl.com/a4y9) American (public) schools cannot force kids to pray, but kids can pray if they want to. Why do some people want to change the constitution to say that all kids should be forced to pray in American schools?

the only reason someone would want to force kids to pray is if they have not ever been able to read the constitution that says freedom of religion and one can not force their religion on others without the other person's consent.

If they are actually doing that, I think it would be because the religious right has a very strong following in America.

There has always been prayer in schools, especially during exams. There wsa never open public prayers in any of my schools but I have always prayed when I needed it and never saw the rationale in making it a law or rule that it be permitted in schools. Prayer is a private matter and show STAY a private matter. If I in my head, want to pray for a few moments, its my business and I don't need or want someone else to set time aside or pass a law that says it's okay. It's between me and my God and no one else. Pray if you want. I don't need anybodies help to do this. And it can never be taken away from me. I haven't a clue why this is ever an issue.

The separation of church and state is an age old argument here in the US. Nothing new is happening really. Christian organizations want prayer in schools. Secular organizations believe that religion of any kind should be practiced at church and home, not in schools. Here's a little history on the matter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separation_of_church_and_state

There's no telling as to their rationalisation for wanting it, but I'd be willing to bet that most of the people behind it are Christian. The way the culture throughout most of the U.S. is, Christians would definitely get the most favour out of organised prayer in public schools, so I would imagine that advocating for it is a good way to insure Christian religious dominance throughout the nation. Considering that the majority of children in the public school system, at least in some parts of the nation, are Christian either orthodox or simply by upbringing, it would certainly serve as a subtle way to pick on other faiths that don't have quite the same numbers behind them. For children, especially younger children, to have most of their peers praying to their Christian God would probably make them very uncomfortable and possible even result in faith based bullying, changing faith through peer pressure is also a very real possibility. Now, I don't think that most of the people advocating for organised prayer in public schools are putting that much diabolical scheming into it, but that is the effect it would most likely have. Which is a very big part of why it's so important to keep organised religion out of the public school system, faith is one arena where the majority should *Not* have any extra power.

Force kids to pray? Who wants that? What's the point? If you try to force kids to pray they might bow their heads or whatever but they won't *really* be praying. I am a Christian and am all for someone praying in school if they choose to but you can't force them.

Pray to whose God though? Pupils in schools nowadays come from all different kinds of faiths don't they? They do over here.

I don't think they are doing that. The teachers union would never allow that to happen. The union is anti-religion.