Dear God,
hope you got the letter, and…
I pray you can make it better down here.
I don’t mean a big reduction in the price of beer
but all the people that you made in your image, see
them starving on their feet 'cause they don’t get
enough to eat from God, I can’t believe in you
Dear God, sorry to disturb you, but… I feel that I should be heard
loud and clear. We all need a big reduction in amount of tears
and all the people that you made in your image, see them fighting
in the street 'cause they can’t make opinions meet about God,
I can’t believe in you
Please, please, please tell me this was a whoosh (bolding is mine).
Unless they’re giving me a paid day off work, this declaration means nothing to me. I remember victims of horrible tragedies every single day, we donate and help where we can. We try to change things and help the needy. We DO something instead of just talking about how horrible it is.
The prayer part is just PR, another example of a politician pretending he has religious values to appease a group of people. They all do it and it’s all a bunch of shit. If they were honest, deeply-religious people to begin with, they wouldn’t be politicians.
So this all is just a piece of corn in a turd to me. “There are plenty of people who pray for peace, but if praying were enough it would have come to be”
Speaking as one of the resident wooly-minded religious fanatics around here, how?
I can pray, remember or do both pretty much any time I choose. I also don’t see the sense in waiting until next Friday to do it. I didn’t get to a church last weekend, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t do my share of praying for the victims just as I’ll continue to do so. If nothing else, even if the atheists are right and I’m talking to thin air or the folks who said the hurricane was God’s judgement are right, it’ll make me feel better.
As for remembering, it seems I may be doing too much of it, at least in public here. I do remember what it feels like to leave my home, knowing it may not be there when I get back and hearing reports that the neighborhood my home was in was flooded. Unlike too many people who evacuated in the face of this hurricane, my home was still standing and dry when I got home. I remember the fear and helplessness, and my heart goes out to them.
I’m 1,000 miles away and I have commitments here I have to uphold. All I can offer is prayer and a bit of cash. As I said, though, I see no sense in waiting until next Friday to do so, and I will pray when I choose to, not when someone in Washington tells me to, and I will support Kalhoun’s and others right not to do so.
Instead of calling for an official day of prayer, our leader should be leading. He should be the take charge guy he pretends to be, and DO something real, and concrete. People need food, medicine, transportation out of the disaster area, and someplace to go to. Pious words with no deeds are nothing. Less talk. More action.
Not sure if you’re kidding but the Flag Code actually does prohibit the flying of a flag at half mast without an executive order.
Of course, the flag code is optional for private citizens but even so, there is nothing comparable for religious practices. It is not the president’s place to advise people on when to pray and declaring a “day” for it is redundant since people already have that option every day of the year.
Declaring a “National Day of Prayer and Rememberance” is a shallow, inappropriate, and useless gesture.
Prayer isn’t going to get people fed, clothed, or housed. Neither is rememberance, whatever the hell that is (“I’d like to order a load of rememberance, enough for ten thousand total strangers, please!”). Officially-sanctioned prayer, close to two weeks after the fact, isn’t going to address any of the physical or spiritual needs that could have been met by providing a speedy and appropriate response to this disaster.
I would assume that most religious people have been praying for the victims (living, dead, and as-yet-unaccounted) and their families for the past 10 days, if they didn’t start as soon as it looked like Something Bad was going to happen. Surely they haven’t been waiting for permission or encouragement from civil authorities. Non-religious people ought not to be exhorted to offer prayers in which they don’t believe.
But hey, it’s cheap, easy, and looks so good to those folks who talk the talk but can’t/won’t walk the walk.
Hard to square with “the original meaning of the text” when the cheif author of the actual ext, Madison, disagreed and thought that it did ban public funds for chaplains. But who am I to speak out against activist courts?
Personally, I think every time a religious person blithely accepts religion becoming a tool of politicians and having government officials to take over as religious leaders and directors of prayer, they help stab the authenticity and sincerity of their own faith in the heart. It’s not particularly offensive to me: I’m used to religious people being arrogant and disdainful of others who don’t believe as they do. It might hurt my feelings, but harms me little as long as no force is put behind it. On the other hand, I have a hard time understanding why more religious people don’t find it deeply offensive that politicians would seek to usurp the functions of civil society and religous leaders. Then I look around and realize that most of the religious people that don’t find it offensive tend to be partisans who value their politics over their faith anyway. Then I have my answer.
But the thing is, we have an “establishment clause” in the constitution, not a “separation of church and state” clause. In all our history as a nation, we have not had a “separation of church of state”. Never. Requiring a true spearation would indeed be an activist decision, because it simply can’t be supported by the text of constitution.
I truly wish we did have a “separation” clause in the constitution. But (Surprise!) the constitution represents a compromise among many people with many different ideas of what should be in it.
Apos: Just because one of the writers thought “X” does not mean that the text means “X”. If you want to search for the original meaning (a fruitless task if ever there was one) you’d have to gather info on what “X” meant to every person who voted for the consitution, not just some guy who wrote it. In the end, all we’re left with that we can be sure everyone understood is what is actually in the text. And the text on this subject is vague. No doubt it is vague for a very good reason-- no one could agree on anything more specific.
Having said all that, I wish presidents would be less overtly religious. It creep me out. But then, I also wish Jessica Alba was standing naked in my living room right now…
Press Release
Date: 8/30/2005
Contact:Denise Bottcher or Roderick Hawkins at 225-342-9037
Governor Blanco Announces Day of Prayer
"As we face the devastation wrought by Katrina, as we search for those in need, as we comfort those in pain and as we begin the long task of rebuilding, we turn to God for strength, hope and comfort.
"I have declared August 31, 2005, a Day of Prayer in the State of Louisiana.
"I am asking that all of Louisiana take some time Wednesday to pray. Pray for the victims and the rescuers. Please pray that God give us all the physical and spiritual strength to work through this crisis and rebuild.
"Please pray for patience for those anxiously waiting to hear from family members or to get word about their homes. Pray for the safety of our hard-working rescuers and those they are bringing to safety.
"I know, by praying together on Wednesday, that we can pull together and draw strength we need; strength, that only God can give us.
“In my prayers, I will also thank God for the strong and resilient people of this state and how they are working to meet this challenge.”
-30-
Seriously, when there is so much to get upset with Bush et al over in this, this Pitfest just shows why Radical Secularists are as doomed to disdain & irrelevancy as Radical Religionists.
I don’t get this particular semantic quibble (which I’ve seen many times before). So, the language of the First Amendment doesn’t say “separation of church and state”, it says “establishment of religion”. So what? If anything, “no establishment of religion” seems more restrictive of government involvement in religious matters than “separation of church and state”. After all, no one, not even the Christian Reconstructionists, wants to simply merge the church and the state into a single institution. No one is advocating that the Baptism and Christening Division of the National Sacraments Administration of the U.S. Department of Religious Affairs be in charge of sprinkling babies or dunking teenagers (as the case may be). I can easily imagine a case where church and state are “separate” institutions, with parallel civil and ecclesiastical governments, perhaps even multiple denominations, but Christianity is nonetheless “established” as the official religion of the government. In fact, this is exactly what the hard-core true blue theocratic fringe in this country professes to want–church and state institutionally “separate” (though cooperating), with an “establishment” of Christianity and “Biblical law”, including state prosecution of religious crimes. Hell, even the Holy Inquisition practiced “separation of church and state” to that extent–after the Church found you guilty of heresy, they didn’t execute you, because executing people is a power which belongs to the state–so they handed you over to the civil authorities and they executed you.
If the First Amendment read “Congress shall make no law violating the separation of church and state”, I think you’d have the Religious Right fulminating about how “sure it says ‘separation of church and state’, but there’s nothing in the Constitution against an establishment of religion”, and Barry Lynn would be the head of Americans United for Religious Disestablishment, and the actual substance of the debate over the proper relationship of government and religion wouldn’t be a whit different.
I personally do not care if there is a day of prayer or not. If there were a God I do not think he would have to be told that there is a need for help. If this God knows all things He doesn’t need to be told that help is needed, and if He allowed these things to happen it is what He wanted to happen. Prayer is not going to change it.
I think of prayer as a lack of faith. To me it is like a child who doesn’t believe his parents will care for them so they beg for food and the necessities of life; hoever, if it makes someone feel less afraid it won’t hurt anyone else.
My continued anger at Bush for various reasons has nothing to do with a declaration like this, though. It’s just a PR move. I’m not sure what’s up with my rant above.
It’s not like I haven’t been praying (sorta, informally) since all of this started. I’ve been doing lots of it. I think it’s silly to put aside a special day for it, as if my retrieving friends from Baton Rouge and helping them get on a bus from here wasn’t a form of prayer in action, something Bush and his cronies seem to be a bit dim about in this situation.
Hey…lots of people pray that way. It’s just another example of the disorganized nature of religion…to the point that it’s meaningless. Each person interprets it differently and no one is “more right” than anyone else. Why anyone would hold stock in any of it remains a mystery to the rest of us.
The various atheists/agnostics/handstabbers are working themselves into a pink lather over this violation of SOCAS. There is no compulsion or violation involved, and therefore they are idiots. Duh.
They are also hypocrites because they think Bush a foaming fundamentalist intent on imposing theocracy by declaring a National Day of Prayer and Remembrance - just like those other noted ideologues Washington, Lincoln, and Clinton.
of you.” doesn’t quite cut it. Nor does a simple thank you.
