On an overcast afternoon, in a modest room in Minneapolis, 23 teenagers are in earnest conversation with one another--and with the Lord. "Would you pray for my brother so that he can raise money to go [on a preaching trip] to Mexico?" asks a young woman. "Our church group is visiting juvenile-detention centers, and some are scared to go," explains a boy. "Pray that God will lay a burden on people's hearts for this."
"Pray for the food drive," says someone.
"There's one teacher goin' psycho because kids are not turning in their homework and stuff. She's thinking of quitting, and she's a real good teacher."
"We need to pray for all the teachers in the school who aren't Christians," comes a voice from the back.
And they do. Clad in wristbands that read W.W.J.D. ("What Would Jesus Do?") and T shirts that declare UPON THIS ROCK I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH, the kids sing Christian songs, discuss Scripture and work to memorize the week's Bible verse, John 15: 5 ("I am the vine and you are the branches"). Hours pass. As night falls, the group enjoys one last mass hug and finally leaves its makeshift chapel--room 133 of Patrick Henry High School. Yes, a public high school. If you are between ages 25 and 45, your school days were not like this. In 1963 the Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling banning compulsory prayer in public schools. After that, any worship on school premises, let alone a prayer club, was widely understood as forbidden. But for the past few years, thanks to a subsequent court case, such groups not only have been legal but have become legion.
The clubs' explosive spread coincides with a more radical but so far less successful movement for a complete overturn of the 1963 ruling. On the federal level is the Religious Freedom amendment, a constitutional revision proposed by House Republican Ernest Istook of Oklahoma, which would reinstate full-scale school prayer. It passed the Judiciary Committee, 16 to 11, last month but will probably fare less well when the full House votes in May. One of many local battlefields is Alabama, where last week the state senate passed a bill mandating a daily moment of silence--a response to a 1997 federal ruling voiding an earlier state pro-school prayer law. Governor Fob James is expected to sign the bill into law, triggering the inevitable church-state court challenge.
But members of prayer clubs like the one at Patrick Henry High aren't waiting for the conclusion of such epic struggles. They have already brought worship back to public school campuses, although with some state-imposed limitations. Available statistics are approximate, but they suggest that there are clubs in as many as 1 out of every 4 public schools in the country. In some areas the tally is much higher: evangelicals in Minneapolis-St. Paul claim that the vast majority of high schools in the Twin Cities region have a Christian group. Says Benny Proffitt, a Southern Baptist youth-club planter: "We had no idea in the early '90s that the response would be so great. We believe that if we are to see America's young people come to Christ and America turn around, it's going to happen through our schools, not our churches." Once a religious scorched-earth zone, the schoolyard is suddenly fertile ground for both Vine and Branches.