This Week in God

September 8, 2007

First up from The God Machine this week is the latest proclamation from the Bush White House, which apparently would like us to pray this weekend.

During this year’s National Days of Prayer and Remembrance, we honor the thousands of victims who died in the brutal and ruthless attacks in New York City, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Our Nation remembers with gratitude the firefighters, police officers, first responders, and ordinary citizens who acted with courage and compassion to save the lives of others, and we pray for the families whose loved ones were taken from them. […]

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim Friday, September 7, through Sunday, September 9, 2007, as National Days of Prayer and Remembrance. I ask that the people of the United States and their places of worship mark these National Days of Prayer and Remembrance with memorial services, the ringing of bells, and evening candlelight remembrance vigils.

I don’t imagine anyone would argue that there’s anything wrong with honoring the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The point here is one of religion and government — this president, on average, has issued a “day of prayer” proclamation every 10 weeks since his inauguration in 2001. We’ve had four White House-endorsed prayer days in just the last four months. No president in U.S. history has ever issued so many official prayer edicts in office.

In fact, in the “good old days,” this didn’t occur. Presidents such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison opposed official government prayer days.

For the truly devout, isn’t every day a day of prayer? Doesn’t that make government proclamations unnecessary? Then again, considering the way the president governs, more Americans are probably praying now than ever before.

The God Machine overall wasn’t nearly as busy this week as it usually is, but there were a couple of other religion stories worth noting.

* A couple of years ago, a Republican-led effort in Congress sought to preserve an 8-foot-tall cross in the Mojave National Preserve, despite two court rulings that said the state-sponsored religious display was a violation of the First Amendment. Lawmakers inserted language in a congressional defense-appropriations bill that transferred government ownership of an acre of land to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in an effort to end government sponsorship of religious symbols on public land.

The argument, in a nutshell, was this: if the cross is unconstitutional on public land, the transfer of ownership of the land to the VFW should make the cross permissible. Instead of a public endorsement of religion, it was, the argument goes, a private war memorial.

This week, a unanimous ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the land transfer was a sham. Judge M. Margaret McKeown, writing for the unanimous three-judge panel, said that “carving out a tiny parcel of property in the midst of this vast Preserve — like a donut hole with the cross atop it — will do nothing to minimize the impermissible governmental endorsement” of the religious symbol.

An ACLU attorney added, “I hope this stops the litigation and the waste of taxpayers’ money. Then they can build a real war memorial that honors all veterans.” Sounds like a good idea.

* And in Dallas, Texas, a local courthouse has a rule that prohibits those with official business from wearing hats. That became controversial when Amardeep Singh, who is a Sikh, entered a courtroom to defend himself in a traffic-citation case while wearing a turban, a religious article for Sikh men.

When Singh tried to explain that his faith requires wearing a turban, Judge Albert B. Cercone reportedly ordered him to leave the courtroom or face arrest.

The Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund said it tried to contact the judge about the incident, but he refused to respond. Left with no other choice, the group contacted the ACLU, which filed a lawsuit this week. It should be interesting.

Have you ever watched the CMA Awards? Cowboy hats rise to the level of religious items in some places, and Dallas is one of those places. If Judge Circone had allowed that Sikh man to wear his turban, Bubba would have been the one suing about having to take off his cowboy hat, probably with the help of some pinko at the ACLU.

  • It has often been remarked that America is an adolescent nation. This used to be a positive, referring to our youth as a nation, our idealism. Now ithis castigation usually refers to our sexual maturity, but it applies equally to our official adoption of the Christian fairy tale for grownups.

    Machiavelli wrote that the Prince must appear to follow religious principles in order to maintain popular support. Of course, if he actually believed such nonsense neither he nor his subjects would be safe. That, in essence, is the “Machiavellian” view of religion.

    Bush adds a whole other dimension: he simply doesn’t give a damn about the real-world consequences for his “subjects”. Religion, for him, is an alternative to entering a program which might enable him to control his alcoholism (and more?) in an adult way. If it makes no sense to the rest us, screw us. We don’t matter.

  • It’s understandable that Bush favors divine intervention – it’s the only thing that will save his presidency.

  • NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim Friday, September 7, through Sunday, September 9, 2007, as National Days of Prayer and Remembrance.

    I hope every Muslim in the US hauls out a prayer rug and follows this edict right on the sidewalks. Shrill O’Lielly will crap his pants.

    Leaving aside where in the Constitution we would find the part that says “The President Shall Order Lots of Prayer Days,” this is one of the many way’s BushBrat supports his “I Am that I Am” delusion.

    The Deciderator catapults a proclamation for people to pray and therefore every religious service that would have occurred Friday to Sunday regardless of what some coke-snorting smirking shithead decreed, will, in his ravaged mind, be taking place because he ordered it. Heh.

    I also wonder how saner religious leaders feel about the draft-dodging war-mongering lying, murderous Chump-in-Chief telling them how to conduct their services. Most of the time we talk about keeping the church out of the state, but the idea of the state in the church is just as alarming.

  • CB: “I don’t imagine anyone would argue that there’s anything wrong with honoring the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks” — I do.

    During this year’s National Days of Prayer and Remembrance, we honor the thousands of victims who died in the brutal and ruthless attacks in New York City, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.

    That’s not prayer, as I understand it. That’s low-level exhortation to deepen and perpetuate the fissures of hatred in the mind. To hell with his pompous, self-righteous, ignorant proclamations. The day he shows the first glimmer of intelligence, humility and compassion is the day I may pay heed to his words.

  • EARTH TO PRESIDENT BUSH: Not everyone in America is religious. Freedom of religion also includes freedom from religion. I wonder – does the almighty Commander Guy feel the same as his Daddy? I don’t know that atheists should be considered citizens, nor should they be considered patriots.

  • Why, in the land of the free, do some feel they have the right to push their religious crap on everybody. Why can’t they be satisfied with just having it for themselves. If the cross were a jewish star in this situation they would be the first to complain to have it removed. Evidence the foot cleaning bath machines in university restrooms for Muslim students. This is why so many are so resentful of those who try to push their religion off on others with condescending authority. Rather than comply with the law they are always trying to find some way to circumvent it because of course…their way is the true way! Bullshit.

    Bush doesn’t need to have the government proclaim prayer days as if we need to be reminded. It was this tragedy of 9/11 that gave Bush the excuse to start a war and begin removing our civil liberties. That brought the shame of torture on our country and the mass murder of almost a million Iraqis. I’ve been praying almost daily for his removal from office and for the truth of 9/11 to be revealed as well as peace for all those who’ve suffered from this ordeal.

    Still, does this mean the president will soon dictate prayer days for all the thousands of soldiers sacrificed during viet Nam. How about prayer days for the people in poverty and the sick in our country. I mean what gives him the right to ordain which days we are to pray for what? Why didn’t he just say, “Today, I pray for…” But Noooooo. His authoritarian personality tells him to mandate days of prayer because”he” thinks that is appropriate. I’m surprised he and Laura aren’t dead already since they feel the suffering more than the families of the troops or the people dead from 9/11 His presidency is an insult to the tragedies he has caused

  • The more things change – the more they remain the same.

    In the World War, we used propaganda to make the boys accept conscription. They were made to feel ashamed if they didn’t join the army. So vicious was this war propaganda that even God was brought into it. With few exceptions our clergymen joined in the clamor to kill, kill, kill. To kill the Germans. God is on our side…it is His will that the Germans be killed. And in Germany, the good pastors called upon the Germans to kill the allies…to please the same God. That was a part of the general propaganda, built up to make people war conscious and murder conscious. Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. This was the “war to end all wars.” This was the “war to make the world safe for democracy.” No one mentioned to them, as they marched away, that their going and their dying would mean huge war profits. No one told these American soldiers that they might be shot down by bullets made by their own brothers here. No one told them that the ships on which they were going to cross might be torpedoed by submarines built with United States patents. They were just told it was to be a “glorious adventure.” –Brigadier General Smedley D. Butler, War Is A Racket

  • I used to work as a door guy at a place where hats weren’t allowed inside. Being that this was Houston, there were quite a few cowboy hats, and many of them were none too pleased to be asked to remove them. We were told to explain how it’s good manners to remove your hat inside, but some people would just leave out of protest.

    It really was like a religion to those people. Oddly enough, the people you’d consider a “True Texan” always knew to take their hats off. It was just the posers who had a problem with it. Go figure.

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