Prayer in Government?
My underlying outrage in what I have posted about Fellowship Foundation (Cedars, C Street properties) and ties to Renaissance Weekend is directly related to my beliefs about prayer's place in federal and state government activities.
I grew up in a politically and religiously conservative
home, granddaughter of European immigrants, and ended up believing precisely
what my parents believed until I went away to college and never looked back,
politically or spiritually. As an aside, I didn't know until much later about my great-grandfather's subversive political leanings that got him deported in 1942, but I digress.
I majored in Anthropology, ended up traveling the world, and tended to fall in love with exotic men. Over the course of my career, I worked in two developing nations whose national religion was not my own, and I accepted the infusion of all things religious into my daily life as I was a guest worker in their countries, and I was not observant of my own traditions.
I had always been vaguely aware of these prayer fests in Washington but thought it was confined to deeply flawed individuals who could not make it through the day without atoning for something.
Now that I realize that this ecumenical approach of C Street organizers was designed to fool the eye (not as sophisticated as trompe-l'oeil, though), I am alarmed and upset by the pervasiveness of this. As AJM said, "The easiest way to hide a piece of straw is a hay stack." Please don't dismiss this as a Christian plot to save souls; this is world domination.
I live in a state that fights to pray at school board meetings; erects ten commandments sculptures in public places; asks people to bow their heads in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ at state-assisted educational events; and allows a new license plate design that features a cross.
I am a stranger in a strange land, unwilling to bend to local custom like I did in those developing nations. As someone who slips into the local chapel from time to time to honor religious loved ones (of all faiths) that I've lost, I believe this to be true:
Matthew 6:5-6
"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."
Prayer and the Bible have been a part of the government since the beginning...It doesn't give me any stomach acid at all. What gives me stomach acid is that these hypocrites and their behavior have done more to damage my religion and our country than the absence of prayer in public ever would. I would gladly give up any reference to God in our government in exchange for politicians who actually lived their religion instead of making it a laughing stock.
Imagine if they actually "did unto others" and were "their brothers keepers," treated others as they would Christ and actually followed the Ten Commandments (particularly 7, 8, 9, and 10)...what a different world we would live in.
July 19, 2009 11:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, they shouldn't have been a part of the government. At MOST they should have been a part of particular peoples' personal lives.
Well, that's because it isn't offensive to you.
Give me a break. It doesn't take the bible to make moral people realize that they have to treat each other well. The bible serves as an excuse for abusing people.
It actually isn't up to you to decide to give up references to god.
I wish religious people could get one thing straight:
MORAL BEHAVIOR DOES NOT EQUAL RELIGIOUSLY ACCEPTED BEHAVIOR! PLEASE UNDERSTAND THAT TRULY MORAL PEOPLE ARE THAT WAY NOT BECAUSE OF RELIGION, BUT BECAUSE THEY ARE MORAL PEOPLE. Religious people can be moral in spite of their biblical fire and brimstone. But people who do the right thing NOT out of fear of eternal fire and brimstone, are truly moral.
July 20, 2009 8:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
HAH. I did not know that Molly. I have BA in Anthro also and it really had an affect on my personal beliefs--hell it still does.
I wrote in a similar vein as you today. ha
Very fine post.
July 19, 2009 2:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
And as the study of Anthropology influenced Stanley Ann Dunham.
From about age eight onward, I knew I wanted to be an anthropologist like Franz Boas or Alfred Kroeber, and a writer.
July 19, 2009 2:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Matthew 6:5-6
Now that's the quote they should have on the sign in the stands at endzone of football games.
Matthew 6:5-6
I've always been dismayed that people who can quote chapter:verse numbers thought they had an actual grasp on faith. Or that if I could not, that I lacked faith. But that is probably the chapter:Verse we should all remember to help us find the hypocrites.
Matthew 6:5-6
Is it that they want to pray in public because they fail so miserably at prayer in private? Does public displays erase their sinful secrets? I don't really know, but I have faith in The One "who sees what is done in secret". I read that somewhere. But just because I can't recall the chapter:verse is no measurement of my faith. It's not where it is in the Bible but where it is in our hearts and only The One knows what is really there, in our hearts, in secret. I just can't always remember exactly where that was. Hmmmm.
Matthew 6:5-6
July 19, 2009 3:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Zap, this is the first time in my life that I have ever quoted chapter and verse. But that verse is perfect for this situation.
July 19, 2009 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, you know, the Pope can't even pray anymore since his wrist is broken. What does that say about his connection to Sky Daddy?
July 20, 2009 8:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
I sometimes wonder what the people at that echelon really believe. I think some of them are the most dangerous form of Christian, that they really think we're in the last days and that we can make policy as if that's true. Then I think there are the real manipulators who use these prayer gatherings the same way we'd think of golf (we're going to engage in an absurd activity but also make some deals along the way...)
Too much Christianity in government is definitely a problem and it's not one that would be solved by bringing other religions into the fold. We simply need more secular elected politicians.
July 19, 2009 11:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
The particular faith tradition, in this case Christianity, is just the vehicle this group is traveling in. I don't think that if you took their profiles, sanitized the data to remove all references to ethnic heritage, language, religion and geographic locale, you would find much difference between them, Ayatollah Khameini, Mullah Omar Muhammed, and Kim Jong Il.
July 20, 2009 9:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Matthew never met David Coe, as we see. :(
Feeling okay, Molly? How about indigestion for a change of pace? See this icky article if not yet read:
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2003/03/0079525
Your Matthew quote is brilliant -- thank you for it. "Arrogant Sanford spits in the face of the book of Matthew."
July 20, 2009 1:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
Now I feel even sicker. I thought these people were only in my family. Now I know they are EVERYWHERE!
July 20, 2009 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
It was Archimedes of Syracuse who said ... Give me a fulcrum, and I shall move the world ...
Religious belief is the fulcrum being used to move the Nation into the direction the religious right (RR) has decided we should be going. Since politicians are so dead set on staying in their political office - local, state, federal - they're the prime candidates needed to apply the leverage necessary at those governmental levels for the RR to make the religious utopia they dream of, regardless the true history religion played in the making of the USA.
July 20, 2009 3:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
Is there any way we can get a crowbar under Sanford and Ensign and get them out of there (office, I mean) I would love to point to their involvement in this mess and say 'get out'... because we have the adultery and well Ensigns actually looks pretty corrupt on the money for sex side as well.
July 20, 2009 4:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is awful hard to isolate religion from not good things that have occurred across time. This makes me wary of believers of all faiths because historical indicators don't much support an investment of trust in what they say. It has the same feeling of government in that results are frequently the exact opposite of what is proposed. It so sucks to have this theme repeat itself over and over.
July 20, 2009 7:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Random thoughts:
1. Jesus was not a Christian and Christianity has very little to do with Jesus' teachings. Jesus was a progressive/socialist - simply note how often he spoke of caring for the poor.
2. God does not interfere or intervene in human affairs. The idea that God would favor US over THEM or the CHOSEN over the MASSES is ludicrous. We are ALL children of God. We are ALL brothers and sisters. We are ALL ONE.
3. God does not reward and punish. WE do that. WE decide what is righteous and worthy. WE decide what is sinful and should be punished. And those standards shift and change at our whim. (Torture on Friday, church on Sunday - no problem.)
4. Petitioning God for favors or blessings or even healing is not prayer. God has already given us everything. WE are the obstacles to our own fulfillment. We say we are children of God. If we truly understood that, what more could we possibly want?
5. Churches, religions, priests and preachers do not want you to be aware of your own divinity. Then they would have no power over you. That is why they always kill the true prophets. There is nothing quite so threatening to the religious establishment than for people to realize that God is within each of us and we really don't need them.
I didn't really intend to go on an anti-religious rant. But it is very disheartening to me that so many think that God is "out there" and there are "chosen ones" who can lead us to Him and if we pray in just the right way that God will favor US over THEM and WE will be rewarded regardless of what suffering we cause our brothers and sisters. It just kind of makes my head explode.
July 20, 2009 10:49 AM | Reply | Permalink