Editors Pose Thesis; Commenter Proves Point

The News Journal editors published an opinion this morning that I agree with whole-heartedly: 'Official prayers' exclude citizens despite claims.

There is a minor controversy here in Delaware about some government bodies starting their meetings with official prayers -- some explicitly sectarian, some not. When challenged, elected officials tend to defend the practice as "tradition." The News Journal takes meets that defense square-on:

Tradition has its virtues, but that's not one of them. The council members are perfectly free to pray, individually or in groups, all they want -- just as long as they don't do it when they are acting in an official capacity.

But they balance that with some common-sense advice to those complaining, noting that the official prayers don't do as much harm as some claim.

Our reservations about the actions of the council members would not begin with their pleas for divine guidance. If anything, we would encourage more of it -- provided it was not part of the meeting.

But, the editors conclude, the tradition of prayer is not worth the damage it does to Democracy:

Reciting a prayer, especially a specific one, such as The Lord's Prayer, as part of a government function, automatically excludes a portion of the audience -- people who pay taxes and have the right to participate in the government business at hand. That should not happen.

Now, normally I advocate against looking at the readers' comments on the News Journal's site. This time, curiosity got the better of me and immediately found a comment by a WalterPerry that I think proves the point:

America is a Christian Nation founded by Bible believing. God Fearing,Jesus Loving & Holy Spirit filled Men & women of God!.Not Muslims,Hindus,Harry Christa's. or any other "religion" If u don't like God or Jesus, id suggest u either SHUT UP, or Move to a Communist country! "Official" Prayers do not exclude ANYONE..Go ahead..Pray!

Walter, dude, take a deep breath and wipe the spittle off your keyboard.

Twitter and the Daily Devotionals

A comment from ShoreThings on my Buddha Machine post has led me into yet another twitter-related post. ShoreThings came to the post based on the title, which popped up in twitter, thinking it would be about the tinybuddha twitter account. Tinybuddha offers regular nuggets of Buddhist wisdom and related quotes. Here's the latest:

"Do not overrate what you have received, nor envy others. He who envies others does not obtain peace of mind." ~Buddha

That led me to wonder what twitter devotionals might exist. So I have done some poking around and found, in no particular order:

• Bible In a Year
  Screw the rules & traditions, just get on with sharing the love, healing and power of Jesus Christ with those around you http://ow.ly/1JI
• The Daily Tao
  A good artist lets his intuition lead him wherever it wants.
• ESV Daily Verse
  In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so
  
• Daily Zen
  "It is better to practice a little than talk a lot."
• Daily Buddhism
  “Neither from itself nor from another, Nor from both, Nor without a cause, Does anything whatever, anywhere arise.”
• Daily Bible Promises
  Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven ... where thieves do not break in and steal. Matt 6:20 http://is.gd/eZoS
  

I didn't find any daily Koran verses, but twitter limits searches per day and I ran out before completing my poking around.

I know there must be others. Anyone have any recommendations?

Happy Hanukkah!

Today begins the Festival of Lights, an eight-day celebration that commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem in the Second Century during a revolt against Greek rule by a Hebrew commander called Judah Maccabee. (Hat tip to wikipedia).

Matt Haughey has posted a link to a fun song for the holiday. One that places it nicely in a modern context.



I grew up in an area that had a healthy mix of faiths. I was raised a Catholic but a great many of my friends were Jewish (and some were Hindu and some Muslim, but that is a post for other holidays). We were aware of and took pleasure in each other's holidays. There was no "War on Christmas." There a universal respect for our various cultures. And there was occasional jealousy over gift-getting traditions, but that was minor.

For a full primer on Hanukkah, I strongly recommend "A Rugrats Chanukah," which tells the story of the Maccabean revolt through the imaginations of Tommy, Chucky, Angelica, and Phil'n'Lil. Watching The Rugrats was an added bonus for me during the time of small children, and this retelling of the Hanukkah story contains one of my favorite Rugrats moments: when Tommy emerges from a cave, dressed as one of the Maccabees, and declares, "A macca-baby's gotta do what a macca-baby's gotta do!"

New Blog (and New Radio Station?) in Delaware

I just stumbled across a new Delaware blog -- WKNZ - Z88.7fm, Harrington, DE -- which will chronicle the effort of a group of local Christian folk to build and run a "25,000 watt HD Christian radio station."

The blog appeared June 10 after the group got its FCC construction permit. That alone took 10 years; the FCC is a slow beast. How long the next steps will take is uncertain, but the permit itself is a large step forward:

We are humbled, blown-away, and a little over whelmed, but after nearly 10 years, the FCC has finally given us the approval to begin building a very powerful Christian radio station on 88.7fm in Delaware. The tower will be in Harrington and the studios in Milton, DE (at least that was the plan 10 years ago!). We are currently in the process of dusting off those plans. Lots has changed in 10 years!

The blog-writers are Bill, Andy, and Elbert (with an "E"). I think Bill is likely Bill Sammons, who I used to know in conjunction with the Delmarva Poultry Industry and who I recall was leading an effort to found a Christian station some years back. I assume this is he and this will be that station, but I don't always pay as close attention as I should and so may be completely wrong.

There's a survey up now, looking for input on what sorts of things to program. I think I'll take it. I'm not particularly Christian, though the Lovely Karen is a woman of faith and we have friends among the Christians, but I applaud diversity on the airwaves. And I don't think we should automatically assume that a Christian radio station will automatically hew to the worst extremes of the "christian right."

The musical choices could be interesting. I'll make the argument, for example, in favor of playing some of the Grateful Dead catalogue. Seriously. One of the things that fascinates me about the Dead's music is the widespread use of the Bible as lyrical source material and inspiration. And their deep exploration into folk music and folk traditions included mining a vein of moral stories and cautionary tales that could fit in the new station's format.

That's my view, anyway.

A Lost Opportunity?

There was a bit of a stink this past week in the Indian River School District here in southern Delaware. I take a mostly cynical view of it, but a story in Time this week suggests that there could have been a very positive learning experience, if we had only looked for it ahead of time.

The requirements of the settlement of the Prayer in Schools lawsuit against the District had teachers and administrators reviewing an updated Religion Policy and a set of real-world examples designed to help them avoid unconstitutional proselytizing. Somewhere along the line, it was suggested that the School District had commanded a cancellation of the pre-Break parties set for this week; parties that traditionally have a Spring/Easter theme.

This caused something of an uproar, even after the District issued a statement saying it had not commanded any cancellations. It doesn't even really make sense, given the status of "easter" as as much a secular holiday as a religious holiday. I don't think it diminishes the special and deeply felt meaning of this holiday for true Christians to see other folks mucking about with the bunny rabbits and the eggs that symbolize new-birth and spring. So there isn't really a lawsuit-based reason to cancel such parties.

My inner cynic suggests that someone angry over the settlement of the lawsuit planted the party-pooping story to generate parental anger and protest. It wouldn't surprise me to see someone try that as a way to gather support for making the public schools more parochial.

But that 's just the voice of the little Elmer Gantry perched on my right shoulder. On my left shoulder is an angel holding up a print-out of the Time story about the many religious traditions that celebrate this time of year and the curious convergence of those holidays this year.

...on this particular Friday, March 21, it seems almost no believer of any sort will be left without his or her own holiday. In what is statistically, at least, a once-in-a-millennium combination, the following will all occur on the 21st:
Good Friday
Purim, a Jewish festival celebrating the biblical book of Esther
Narouz, the Persian New Year, which is observed with Islamic elaboration in Iran and all the "stan" countries, as well as by Zoroastrians and Baha'is.
Eid Milad an Nabi, the Birth of the Prophet, which is celebrated by some but not all Sunni Muslims and, though officially beginning on Thursday, is often marked on Friday.
Small Holi, Hindu, an Indian festival of bonfires, to be followed on Saturday by Holi, a kind of Mardi Gras.
Magha Puja, a celebration of the Buddha's first group of followers, marked primarily in Thailand.

Yesterday would heave been a perfect opportunity for comparative religion parties in the schools using the many holidays, traditions, foods, dances, music and art to explore a wide variety of cultures.

"Half the world's population is going to be celebrating something," says Raymond Clothey, Professor Emeritus of Religious studies at the University of Pittsburgh. "My goodness," says Delton Krueger, owner of www.interfaithcalendar.org, who follows "14 major religions and six others." He counts 20 holidays altogether (including some religious double-dips, like Maundy Thursday and Good Friday) between the 20th (which is also quite crowded) and the 21st. He marvels: "There is no other time in 2008 when there is this kind of concentration."

The article points out that, in fact, it's only nine times in 800 years that "Good Friday, Purim, Narouz and the Eid would occur in the same week" and only one time that they would ever happen within a two-day period.

I guess we missed a chance to teach. Maybe next time?

Oh, For Jack's Sake!

Sometimes a headline is just perfect:

Suit tries to put the 'Christ' back in 'Halloween'

This was the headline on an AP story on the News Journal web site this afternoon. A family in suburban Philadelphia are suing school officials because their 10-year old wasn't allowed to dress as Jesus Christ for Halloween.

The school has a policy against promoting specific religions, according to the story, and "the boy and his mother are Christians who object to the pagan elements of Halloween."

If I may be multiply politically incorrect for a moment, let me say that here we have dueling stupidness.

Christian fundamentalists, please calm down. It's Halloween. Just a day when kids put on costumes and ask for candy. Grow up and let the kids be kids.

School administrators, settle down too. If the boy wants to dress as Christ, let him. If he's proselytizing and annoying the other kids, I suspect they'll sort the little prick out in their own way. There's no reason to let this escalate into a media case.

This is just so stupid. And now we have a story for everyone to comment on. This will not go well.

Though it does give me a great example of what depresses me about the anonymous commenting on the News Journal web site. Someone calling him- or herself SaneHatter had this to say:

GOOD! About time people of Christian faith stood up to the anti-christian morons in this country with their hypocracy and whinny crybaby I'm offended crap. God bless you son, may you win many times over.*

I followed the links back to the whole wonderful collection of SaneHatter's thoughts. This is a very unpleasant and angry person.

* (No, I did not bother to edit for spelling or grammar)

Book Signing

I got to have an author sign his book for me this past week-end. Tom Starnes, a retired Methodist minister I know through Karen's church, has published a memoir, Through Fear to Faith. He held a book-signing down at Browseabout Books in Rehoboth Beach on Saturday morning and I stopped by.

Tom filled-in at Epworth United Methodist in Rehoboth some years ago when they were between ministers. Karen enjoyed his sermons and I liked him the few times I attended. Since then, we've seen him around a fair amount; he's retired here. And I get to play golf with him every once in a while when the Methodists have a fellowship golf outing.

I've mentioned Tom here before. He writes occasional Community View columns for the News Journal that I always enjoy. I look forward to reading his memoir.