www to http resolve for Rails app on passenger - ruby-on-rails

Question

I am running a rails app on phusion passenger. I want to resolve all www addresses to http for SEO benefits.
I am using phusion along with the apache server and for performance benefits would like the redirect to be in the httpd.conf file instead of the .htaccess file. I added the redirect in the httpd.conf file but it redirects to the public folder of the application on every url request. I wrote to my hosting provider and got the following response:
Since passenger is configured for your rails application via .htaccess, the direct rules through htaccess will not work. But, htaccess directs will work fine with non rails applications.
If you really wish to redirect www.xyz.com to xyz.com, you have to add a code similar to the following in your application.
-------
before_filter :check_uri
def check_uri
if /^www/.match(request.host)
redirect_to request.protocol + request.host_with_port[4..-1] + request.request_uri
end
end
I think this is not good for performance of the application. Is there any way I can redirect from the httpd.conf file itself?
Here is the httpd.conf file:
This redirects www to the public folder instead of http
<Directory "/home/xyz">
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.(.*)$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://%1/$1 [R=301,L]
</Directory>
<VirtualHost 1.1.1.1:80>
SuexecUserGroup "#500" "#501"
ServerName xyz.com
ServerAlias www.xyz.com
ServerAlias webmail.xyz.com
ServerAlias admin.xyz.com
#DocumentRoot /home/xyz/public_html
DocumentRoot /home/xyz/public
DirectoryIndex index.html index.htm index.php index.php4 index.php5
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} =webmail.xyz.com
RewriteRule ^(.*) https://xyz.com:20000/ [R]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} =admin.xyz.com
RewriteRule ^(.*) https://xyz.com:10000/ [R]
RemoveHandler .php
RemoveHandler .php5
IPCCommTimeout 31
FcgidMaxRequestLen 1073741824
<Files awstats.pl>
AuthName "xyz.com statistics"
AuthType Basic
AuthUserFile /home/xyz/.awstats-htpasswd
require valid-user
</Files>
Alias /dav /home/xyz/public_html
<Location /dav>
DAV on
AuthType Basic
AuthName "xyz.com"
AuthUserFile /home/xyz/etc/dav.digest.passwd
Require valid-user
ForceType text/plain
Satisfy All
RemoveHandler .php
RemoveHandler .php5
RewriteEngine off
</Location>
</VirtualHost>