Many Americans favor prayer and other forms of religious expression in public schools, though few support making school prayer mandatory, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.
The findings come from a Pew Research Center survey conducted April 6-12 among U.S. adults.
The survey found that 78% of U.S. adults favor allowing students to voluntarily pray in student-led groups. Support was lower for allowing coaches to lead their teams in prayer (57%), displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms (50%), and allowing teachers to lead their classes in prayer (46%).
Eight percent of those surveyed say students should be required to participate. Another 53% say teacher-led prayer should be permitted only if participation is voluntary, while 37% say teachers should not be allowed to lead classroom prayer at all.
According to Pew, views on teacher-led prayer vary sharply by political affiliation. Most Republicans and Republican-leaning independents support allowing teachers to lead classroom prayer in some form, while a slight majority of Democrats and Democratic leaners oppose it, even if participation is voluntary.
The survey found that religious affiliation also shaped responses. Most religiously unaffiliated Americans said teachers should not be allowed to lead classroom prayer, while White evangelical Protestants and Black Protestants expressed the strongest support for it. A majority of Catholics also favor allowing teacher-led prayer, provided students are not required to participate.
Pew found broad support for voluntary student prayer across political, religious, and demographic groups. Nearly two-thirds of religiously unaffiliated Americans, along with large majorities of Catholics, White evangelical Protestants, Black Protestants, Republicans, and Democrats, favor allowing students to voluntarily pray in student-led groups.
Views were more divided on coach-led prayer and displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms. Pew found those practices received stronger support among Republicans, older Americans, and residents of the South and Midwest, while Democrats and religiously unaffiliated Americans were generally more likely to oppose them.