Prayer proclamations should come from clergy, not Congress

By J. Brent Walker

Reflections
May 15, 2002

Last week our nation observed a day of prayer. As a result of an act of Congress in 1952 designating a National Day of Prayer - as well as annual proclamations of presidents - our government has been telling us when to pray for 50 years.

What's wrong with designating a special time for prayer and urging Americans to pray? There's nothing wrong with people of faith getting together to pray on a designated day. In fact, every day should be a day of prayer. The rub comes when the government declares it to be such and exhorts its citizens to engage in a religious exercise.

Although most presidents have issued prayer proclamations, some did not. Thomas Jefferson, for example, refused to issue a Thanksgiving proclamation, because he believed that it was both unconstitutional and unwise. In an 1808 letter, Jefferson wrote:

Fasting and prayer are religious exercises; the enjoining them an act of discipline. Every religious society has a right to determine for itself the times for these exercises, and the objects proper for them, according to their own particular tenets; and this right can never be safer than in their own hands, where the Constitution has deposited it.

James Madison, the father of our Constitution, was no less opposed to such proclamations. Apparently bowing to political pressure, he issued several prayer proclamations during his time in office. But in later years, Madison repented for those actions, recognizing that prayer proclamations tended to "imply and certainly nourish the erroneous idea of a national religion - [and] carry the grave risk of using religion to serve the political ambitions of the moment."

Despite these reservations about the wisdom of prayer proclamations, the National Day of Prayer has become firmly ingrained in our political culture. In most years, it seems that hardly anyone raises an eyebrow. As David Corn, Washington editor of The Nation magazine, recently observed, "Jefferson and Madison are losing the debate. Shirley Dobson [of the National Day of Prayer Task Force] and Pat Robertson are winning."

This year, the tradition went a step further. Not only did our government tell us whenM. would be a good time to pray, it also told us what to pray. The "Prayer for America," reproduced in the sidebar, was written by Dr. Lloyd Ogilvie, the chaplain of the United States Senate and, as such, a government employee whose office is financed by tax money.

True, this prayer was not mandated as was the New York Board of Regent's prayer that was declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Engel vs. Vitale (1962). And it was promoted mainly by the NDP Task Force, a nongovernmental organization. But the specter of a governmental official writing a prayer for the nation to pray - no matter how much one may support the sentiment expressed in the prayer - would make Jefferson, Madison and Elder John Leland, turn over in their graves.

Compounding the problem, the prayer reflects both a theistic and Christian bent, even though not prayed in Jesus' name. The fact that real prayer by definition must be uttered in the context of someone's faith tradition makes a putative "nondenominational prayer" an oxymoron and highlights the reasons government should not be involved in prescribing religious exercises.

Exhorting our country to repentance and prayer on designated days is quite proper. But it's more appropriately called for by the preachers, priests and prophets among us, not civil magistrates, the Congress or even a legislative chaplain.