Burn, Sinners! It's the National Day of Prayer!
by Michael Brendan Dougherty
Against the wishes of a judge in Wisconsin, President Obama issued a proclamation marking May 6, 2010 as a National Day of Prayer.
As expected, sectarians of every faith engaged in an orgy of sacral violence against atheists, liberals, and gays-incidentally killing almost the entire membership and clergy of the Episcopal Church. In Manhattan this morning, the screams of sinners about to face their final Judge were accompanied by a live performance by Jars of Clay on the former Today Show set.
Assorted Jews and members of the Nation of Islam clashed in the streets of Brooklyn and lower Manhattan. And public school teachers, interpreting the president’s signal, began playing “The Passion of the Christ’ on loop in classrooms as part of a religious revision to the No Child Left Behind Act.
Some observers believe Obama has reignited the worst religious violence in America since the Catholic League protested a 1991 Martin Scorsese film by burning nearly 23,000 cinephiles on a pyre. When reached for comment today, Catholic League President Bill Donahue sighed, “It’s unbelievable that in the year 2010, Scorsese still lives. We’ll be praying to St. Anthony hoping to find him today.”
According to Shirley Dobson, chairwoman of the National Day of Prayer Taskforce, the slaughter “will cleanse the nation of the unrighteous and bring about God’s favor.” Dobson added, “We should thank President Obama for making this possible.”
Many Church groups organized special “Wall tearing” commemorations, where believers scaled freestanding “Walls of Separation” before machine gunning and dynamiting them.
The annual outpouring of religious enthusiasm and irreligious entrails continues its divisive legacy sixty-year legacy, having been instituted by Harry Truman, the most notable theocrat in the Western World since Oliver Cromwell.
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SORRY! Had to get that out of my system. Anyway, the National Day of Prayer and the attendant controversy aren’t really as interesting as the above. I hardly knew we had a National Day of Prayer until the Obama White House and Fox News reminded me. After all, we already have Thanksgiving-which John Adams, in his wisdom, wanted to be a day of penance and “humiliation.”
The National Day of prayer is probably the most milquetoast expression of “religion” ever invented. It is not even billed as a day to pray for the Nation, which would make some kind of sense coming from the government of a religiously pluralistic people. Instead it is a day where Evangelical and other pressure groups ask the president to issue a proclamation-it’s one step up from the kind of thing your town gives to Little League coaches and admirable garbage men. In turn, we citizens may respond to the proclamation by praying to whatever for no reason in particular. You can really feel the hot child-molesty breath of theocracy on your crotch, can’t you?
And yet, the National Day of Prayer is becoming something like an authentic expression of American religion now that it is controversial. Like the rest of our controversies over what it “means” to be an American it places the president as a kind of God King, and the Courts as a magisterium, interpreting our sacred American texts. Winners of these cases talk about themselves and “the American way” in the way some conservative Christians speak of being “orthodox” in belief and practice.
Depending on the occupant of the Oval Office, whole sections of the country feel as if they are no longer welcome in America-demeaning the other parts as Jesusland or as coastal liberal elitists. Every cultural preference must be endorsed or mystically embodied by the President and government in some way or the people of those preferences feel anxious.
It’s why we note that the Supreme Court may no longer have Protestants on it. It is why it was important to have a first black president. It’s a common attitude in ethnically and religious diverse democracies to want literal representatives of each group. But it is also dangerous for a country that sees itself as having a historical mission to the world.
If you believe America has some kind of historical purpose other than being the home of Americans, that it must serve as an example of progress and tolerance, or as the protector and promoter of free markets and “values,” then inconsequential bullshit like the National Day of Prayer turns into a big important broil. Great atheists like Nietzsche would be aghast if you suggested it was worth a penny of their scorn. Great saints, reformers, or Rabbis would and should see it as a shabby insult, or a blasphemy. But “America” is at stake!
It’s sad. But America’s desire for a country with a purpose has made this nation as desperate for absolute authority in government as any since the fifteenth century. Goodbye nation of laws, hello nation of “values.” God help us.
Michael Brendan Dougherty is a contributing editor to The American Conservative. He writes from Mount Kisco, New York.