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I must say that all this chatter about prayer in schools has me a little confused.

My 5-year-old daughter, Zoe, attends a public school and prayer blankets her day.

As her school bus rolls into the morning darkness, I pray that she will be OK, that she will have a pleasant experience in her well-lit classroom, that she will master writing the number 5.

While I'm applying my mascara, I pray that she will neither harm nor be harmed.

On my journey to work I ask God to please make Zoe's insulin pump work. That her sugars will neither plummet nor significantly rise. That no alarms will sound. That the pump and infusion set would not suffer damage through horseplay or vandalism.

And throughout the day I pray again, petitioning for her safety and good fortune.

Zoe says that she prays in school.

She maintains that she quickly bows her head before her meals, although I would have to see it to believe it. She asserts that at snack time she asks God for rain.

At bedtime we pray for her teachers, especially the teacher's assistant who must check Zoe's blood sugars at least twice a day and cajole her to pee on a stick when her sugar is high.

If we remember, we ask God to place His hand upon the bus driver and the teacher down the hall who has a sick spouse.

And I have told Zoe that whenever she is worried, scared or threatened, that she can quietly pray in her head. There's no need to draw attention to a very private thing and get everyone all in a lather.

She can ask God to help her cope with whatever situation she is facing. Maybe she can hum that little song we learned in church, something about doing all things through Christ.

In my perfect world, all of Zoe's teachers would be conservative Presbyterians with a strong grasp of God's sovereignty and predestination. And they would be at liberty to shade each lesson with those views.

In my perfect world, Zoe would not have diabetes and her mother would never yell at her in bouts of frustration. Her grandfather would still be alive and raking leaves.

But for those of us who view the world through Biblical lenses, we believe that the world is fallen — flat on its tail just like Humpty Dumpty.

And so it seems a little pointless to expect those who don't know Christ to follow our ways when God hasn't prescribed the glasses to them yet — if ever.

Years ago when I was a 22-year-old newlywed, I taught six grade levels of English in a Christian school in one semester. Praying before each class was a wonderful thing. With no pressure from the state regarding end-of-course tests, we could sometimes take anywhere from five to 20 minutes sharing prayer requests and bowing our heads.

Preparing six different lesson plans was much easier with the cushion of prayer.

Maybe the reason that there is so little prayer in public schools is because so many of the folks who do pray have fled them, some for valid reasons and some for unjustified fear.

Salt tastes best when it is lightly sprinkled on the entire entrée — not poured in one spot.

Janice Carmac is an editorial assistant for the News & Record. Contact her at 373-7098 or jcarmac@news-record.com.