Making an end-run around church-state separation

Sue Clark

On Saturday, I attended a heart-breaking funeral. One of my former

students, from a close-knit Russian community, had been shot in

Sacramento and had died at age 17.

Pavel, or Paul, as we called him, had a handsome face and a

personality that could only be described as “merry.” He was not a

perfect guy; he wasn’t particularly academic and often goofed around

in class. He had a loud voice and a big sense of humor, so he was

invariably caught.

I’d walk by the row of chairs where students waited to see our

vice principal, and he’d look up at me.

“Sorry, Miss Clark,” he’d say, looking dejected. He really meant

it. He never blamed anyone else. He took full responsibility.

What separated Pavel from some other students was his remorse. I

knew he could never be a hardened sociopath, and I took comfort from

that. Plus, I really liked him, and his eyes always twinkled.

The funeral was entirely in Russian, with three preachers

comforting the large group of friends and family. One minister kindly

broke into English and thanked Pavel’s classmates and teachers who

had come. I had been close with one of Pavel’s older sisters, and

knew the rest of the family to some extent. Our vice principal had

been especially close with Pavel’s mother, and several other teachers

had worked with him and the family since he was in seventh grade.

The service was brutal. Although spoken in another language, much

came through. If you listened to the meaning instead of the Russian,

you could hear overwhelming grief, despair, outrage and anger. You

could also hear faith in God and hauntingly mournful Russian hymns.

OK, if you are atheist or want a Christian, Muslim, Buddhist,

Jewish or Confucian agenda in schools, stop here and don’t bother

reading any further. You read about the loss of a jolly, well-loved

young man, and you heard a bit about a Russian funeral. You saw that

I wasn’t going to go into a diatribe about gun control.

Because now I want to talk about the phone call I got from his

older sister the next day. She had been devastated and broken at the

funeral. She’d gone up to the casket and stroked her brother’s head

and bent over in grief. Sobbing, she’d spoken to him in Russian,

murmuring endearments, until she was crying so hard she had to be

guided back to her seat, where an older sister sat with her arm

around the youngest one, who was only 8 or 9 years old.

“Sue, this is Anna,” she said. “My parents and I want to know if

you will hold a prayer for Paul at your school. It would bring my

parents some peace if you would have all of the students pray for his

soul. Please do this for us.”

I have spent the rest of the weekend trying to figure out how to

do this for them. I left a message with my boss.

“Karen, how can we do this? Are we allowed to do this?” I asked.

What stopped me was the separation of church and state, something

I have believed in my whole life. I am a big proponent of this

concept when it suits me -- i.e., when Christians attempt to instill

their religion in public schools. I am the first to oppose the

various fundamentalists who think we should replace our science

curriculum with their ideas. I have campaigned against local school

board candidates who are, in my estimation, attempting to create

public schools in their own religious mold. Yet here I was trying to

find a way around the concept I have defended my whole life.

In other words, I was in the odd position of finding a way to do

an end-run around an idea I believe in.

I work with students who are at-risk for dropping out of school.

Some of them have had pretty terrible lives and many have had

experiences that have made them old beyond their years. Yet in the 33

years I’ve counseled teens, I have not had one who wasn’t touched by

these words: “I will say a prayer for you.”

Although I believe in God, I’m not religious, nor do I go to a

church. My students have been Muslim, Catholic, fundamentalist

Christian, Buddhist, and every faith imaginable. I have even worked

with a Zoroastrian family. Also, I have known thousands of kids who

professed to not have any faith.

Yet every one (every one!) who heard me say, “I will say a prayer

for you,” was moved. The power of knowing a kind adult was keeping

them in her prayers would touch them -- from a tough wannabe

gangbanger to the girl going in for an HIV test. This short sentence

would bring a family to tears or cause a huge angry boy to choke up.

What I hope will happen will be a prayer to the God of each kid’s

understanding. If an atheist or two is in the crowd, perhaps they

will think good thoughts, too. Probably, we will have a moment of

silence instead. If depends on the administration.

I remember once stopping in the midst of a rowdy group of boys who

were challenging each other. “Oh God,” I intoned, comically and

loudly, “help me with these rowdy boys. Make me patient with them.

Get them to class so they can get a diploma.”

They laughed and left for class. The power of prayer in schools

works again.

As for me, I hope you will keep Pavel, Anna and the rest of the

family in your own prayers. To the higher power of your

understanding, of course.