With its current separation-of-church-and-state emphasis, the United States has, in effect, established atheism as its semi-official state religion. An atheistic mindset is drummed into public school students.

As a public school teacher, this separation forced me to teach kids to think like atheists. I had to leave God out of everything I taught. Isn’t that an atheist’s thought pattern?

Books such as “The Golden Compass” promote atheism and are made available to students, but don’t try that with God’s truth.

Moral values that the Bible supports are treated as imposing religion while destructive unbiblical ones become required instruction, such as the gay agenda, which promotes a lifestyle that cuts life expectancy in half.

Atheistic interpretations of origins and history are treated as science while strong evidence that virtually disproves those interpretations is silenced.

This is sad in light of the Supreme Court decision Holy Trinity Church v. U.S., 1892, which dedicates the last half to documenting the conclusion that “This is a Christian nation.”

Careful research revealed in the book “Already Gone” by Ken Ham and Britt Beemer demonstrates that this mindset has already emptied many churches of young people. Is that the proper role of government?

Don Colburn Howard