Well, here we go again. A little cabal of thought-controller wannabes in the Colorado Legislature wants schools to display the 10 Commandments and observe a moment of silence at the beginning of each school day. All this to make our schools safe! All this to keep kids from violent behavior!

Please! Let's forget for a moment that teaching religion in public schools is unconstitutional. The 10 Commandments are valuable precepts for living good lives, but they have not stopped people from hurting one another. Human history is full of people who did terrible things to their fellow humans because of religion. That's one of the reasons our constitution separates church and state.

We need only look to the ferocity with which Christians and Muslims killed one another in Bosnia and Kosovo. Would posting the 10 Commandments in those countries have stopped this horror? When the Church dictated what people could believe in Europe and Latin America, we had the Inquisition. Those who dared to disagree with these dictates suffered arrest, torture and even death. The 10 Commandments didn't stop this terror. Hanging them in schools won't stop future ones either.

Let's remember how the Pilgrims left England to get away from the dogma of the Church of England. They endured great suffering in search of religious freedom. The ideals for which they struggled are embedded in our Constitution. They are there to prevent just the kind of persecution that the Pilgrims fled-persecution arising from a conflict of ideas, from the lack of freedom to believe what you choose.

But, our little band of legislators wants to change that. They want a moment of silence-for what reason if not for religious thought?-in our public schools. If students want to think about religion, they are free to do so. Other students should not be subjected to the religious values of a particular group with whom they may not agree.

Combining religion and state creates a theocracy. We can be grateful that we do not live in such a society. Take Afghanistan, where the Taliban have brutally imposed their brand of Islam. Little girls can't go to school; women cannot leave their homes without the company of a man-even though many mothers are widows and have no way to support their children. Or, what about Iran after the fall of the Shah? Freedom of religion and thought were brutally suppressed. That's not why America was founded.

America guarantees freedom to all people who come to our shores. Be they Christian, of whatever denomination, Muslim, Jewish, atheist or something else, each person has a right to believe what he or she wants. Governments, federal, state or local, may not dictate what we believe or think or say.

Some may say, "What's her problem? A moment of silence doesn't have to be religious." I say, "Come on, now. Look who's pushing this. And for what purpose?" The purpose is to promote prayer. Prayer is wonderful in its proper place. People are welcome to pray whenever they wish. But-it isn't appropriate in a public school where children of many beliefs come to learn.

Personally, I find it very hypocritical for these legislators to try to impose their beliefs on the rest of us. They constantly pontificate about keeping government off our backs. They forever rant about personal freedom. Apparently, they don't believe in either of these principles. What they are really trying to do is to force the rest of us, and most notably, our children, to believe what they believe-the form of Christianity they espouse. And, they want the government they claim to despise to force us to accept their views.

Would they be so eager to have religious literature posted in our schools if it were verses from the Koran or Taoist principles? I doubt it. Rather than pander, let's have a real dialogue about violence in our society, about how to eliminate hatred and bigotry, about how to create a society that welcomes all points of view, as our founders imagined. Simplistic solutions to complex societal problems may sound good. But, they don't work. And, they undermine American freedom.