Defending Freedom From Religion

FERVENTLY I HAD HOPE IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN, but, alas, it has. Some Christian conservative with the prescription for giving unto America just what the doctor ordered asserted, in my presence, that America started going downhill the very moment that prayer was removed from public schools. That would have been...what...1962? It was not, if memory serves, a particularly close or hotly debated topic. there seems to have been at the time a fairly widespread consensus among American intellectuals that the separation of church and state was worth defending. The word "God" does not appear in the constitution - for a reason, a very good reason. Every American is and must forever remain free to practice any religion, or no religion, and for that reason alone, all government structures must be free from all religion, including religious activities and rituals. We must all have the freedom to be free from religion. government must remain secular, as it has always been, and was carefully designed to be by the founders. Arguably, America started going downhill when a group of greedy get rich quick schemers arrived in Virginia in 1607, and when they introduced slavery into their community in 1619. Or when, in 1620, a group of intolerant religious fanatics arrived in Massachusetts. One can use any date or event one chooses to describe the alleged beginning of America's deterioration, or, it is also possible to argue that America never has "gone downhill", and isn't about to begin doing so now, or ever. America's problems might have more to do with a loss of manufacturing or economic inequality or perhaps environmental damagey rather than public prayer, or its absence.