Letter to the Editor

    Dear Editor:
    I feel compelled to respond to your article (Nov. 7, Don’t Tread on Me, page 2) about the “hypocritical” and “prejudiced” majority that berate all the “crybabies” and tell them that a “person is wrong and will burn in hell” if they do not pray at football games.
    First of all, the First Amendment of the Constitution states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or abridging the free exercise thereof.”
    Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that the practice of religion must be held solely in churches or residences, only that religion will not be illegal or above the law.
    We have the right to assemble peaceably, whether it is to watch football, protest war or have a prayer.
    We are not guaranteed “freedom for all,” either. We are guaranteed freedoms by our Constitution.
    If “freedom for all” were actually contained in the Constitution, there would be no need for a Bill of Rights, and slavery at the conception of the United States would have been illegal.
    No place of worship I have ever been has ever “promised” me prayer on Sunday; it was kind of expected whenever I got there.
    And you are right when you say that people would be angered to find their church of choice conducting a rave instead of prayer and worship.
    But the comparison of a pre-football game prayer to a rave is nonsensical.
    If you have ever heard one of these prayers, they usually contain messages of athlete health, doing your best and blessings for the community.
    I have never heard of accusing the fans and players of sinning, just to get them to conform to “teachers and principals (people youngsters are taught to respect)” on pain of hell directly before an athletic contest.
    The losing coach usually does the only raving in these matches.
    I do want television and movies to be censored more, not because I believe I am in a “minority and not being heard,” but because I love my two kids and do not want to have to explain death, sex and acts of violence to them before they get out of diapers and before they are mature enough to understand them.
    I hope you wrote this article just for shock value to garner a response from the public.
    These ideas you tell of are extremely general and nearsighted to the actual truth of the matter.
    As your career in the mass media grows, I pray that you will express opinions that resemble something more to truth and are researched a little more than this article.
    My prayer is not a sin of pride because pride is the absence of faith that God will answer all prayers and provide all things.
    Trying to do things yourself instead of with Him is a sin of pride.
    Chris Freeze
    South Campus Student