If you go out on the streets right now and ask a group of random people “what does the separation of church and state mean?” I’m willing to bet that a limited number of them won’t ever say what it really means.
Thomas Jefferson coined the phrase “separation of church and state,” in a letter to the Danbury Baptists on January 1, 1802. This letter stated that Congress shall make no law restricting what the church does in any way, or stop its people from sharing the gospel. Therefore saying that state stays out of the church.
However with all that, the most implied common meaning of today is that the church stays out of the government. This is why many students fear saying anything in schools, and employees are afraid to say anything in a work environment.
Looking back to the founding of our country you see that one of the major reasons we came over to the new world was for our religious freedom. So those who say we have no right to pray in schools, or that teachers can’t talk about God, have no clue what they’re saying.
Today it’s thought that the church has no power anymore, that government has a say in everything it does. That’s wrong, very wrong. In fact those who whine about prayer never seem to notice that there is prayer before inaugurations; there’s even a Congressional Prayer room, every Wednesday at 11 a.m. The Liberty bell has scripture on it, The Supreme Court building has a carving of Moses and the Ten Commandments on it. The original constitution of all 50 states mention God, and the Declaration of Independence mentions God four times.
This shows that the churches are involved with the government and that the way people think today about it’s wrong. Also it proves that state don’t reject what the church does; in fact there are pastors in Congress. I would know, I’ve met them.
Compared to Christians from only 20 years ago, new Christians now fear to admit to anything about the church or about God because they fear something bad will happen to them. But as stated before, the phrase separation of church and state means the state stays out of the church, not the other way around.