The National Day of Prayer: the value of offending

By Paul A. Ibbetson

A federal judge in Wisconsin has ruled that the National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional as it is reported to violate the first amendment against the government's establishment of religion. No, the lawsuit was not filed by the anti-Christian ACLU, but by an organization known as the Freedom from Religion Foundation. The Freedom from Religion Foundation, an organization of overbearing agnostics and atheists, has decided, as liberals often do, that it would be in the best interest of their minority to require the majority within America to live as they do, Godlessly.

However, in the larger scheme of things, the National Day of Prayer has been under attack by many forces besides the "No God Here" group from Madison, Wisconsin. President Barack Obama was already scaling back the National Day of Prayer before the court ruling took place. Harry Truman created the National Day of Prayer back when one could use the concept of prayer and the Democratic Party in the same sentence without receiving strange looks. George W. Bush made the National Day of Prayer a very public event where religious leaders would come to the White House and offer prayers. The overarching theme of such gatherings and of the event itself was not focused on a specific religion, but on the idea that America is a country where prayer has value and worth. President Barack Obama reduced the public White House event to a memo in his first year in office.

So what should Americans do in the face of those who attempt to strip God from all aspects of American life starting with prayer? Those who attempt to change history to make it read as if our founding fathers did not believe in the paramount importance of faith when it came to the grand experiment that is America? Those that have an agenda that is nothing short of an attack on religion itself? I believe that mainstream America should be offensively straightforward on what we believe and what we stand for as one nation under God. Be it annoying the agnostics, aggravating the atheists, or simply making the liberals livid, we must stand tall for the necessity of kneeling in prayer. We must acknowledge the forces that are at work to separate America from God. This attempt is seen in the deceptive nature of the Day of Prayer observation argument. To deny the simple acknowledgement of the value of communication with a higher power is nothing short of poisoning the seedlings from which organized religion grows. No matter how it is presented, the arguments forwarded by groups such as the Freedom from Religion Foundation are nothing more than the usual vomitous verbal spray of liberal propagandists who try to sell Godlessness as the freethinker's utopia.

Well, freethinkers, think freely on this: the battle for the soul of this nation will end with a winner and a loser. Communication with the divine is the lifeline of America's survival and prosperity. It is more valuable to the body of this country than air is to the lungs. Without it we are doomed, and will die as a nation gasping in the dark. This being true, the voices of opposition become of little importance to a national recognition of the value of prayer. Would we feel regret or concern if animosity were heaped upon us for simply breathing? Of course not. Our answer to such challenges would be, quickly and without hesitation, "too bad, it's what I do; it's how I survive."

The National Day of Prayer is a symbol of the nation's undeniable need to communicate with God, to breathe in the unmistakable life-giving bounty of the Almighty. Offending the "No God Here" crowd has merit as a public display that we Americans, as individuals and as a country, have not completely lost our way. That we, like the founding fathers, still believe in talking to God, still believe in the power of prayer.

© Paul A. Ibbetson