Hindu Prayer in Senate: Still Waiting for Armageddon
It’s funny. It has been over 48 hours, and the Earth is still spinning on its axis, a giant crack in the Earth hasn’t opened up and swallowed Washington DC, and no asteroids are raining down upon us in a fire-and-brimstone apocalypse.
The way the fundies have been talking these last few days, I was convinced that the end was nigh. What they’re upset about this time is that the daily prayer that opened the Senate on Thursday was delivered by a Hindu. This is the first time ever. Every day that the Senate has been in operation since 1789, they have started the day praising Jeebus or some other Judeo-Christian pink elephant. In a surprising bit of tolerance, and a reflection of the diversity that makes up our great nation, the Senate decided to let a Hindu have the honor of saying the prayer that day.
This, of course, did not sit well with the fundies. In fact, three of them interrupted the prayer by creating a commotion in the visitor’s gallery. If the situation had been reversed and somebody had tried to interrupt the Christian prayer that normally opens the Senate, you can be sure that some fundies would be claiming “Christian persecution”. Another interesting point is further down that article:
Zed [the Hindu chaplain] addressed a mainly empty Senate chamber. Among other staff, only Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) were present for the opening invocation and Pledge of Allegiance. Reid’s office sponsored Zed’s request to serve as a guest chaplain. Inhofe was there to deliver a speech moments later on the Fairness Doctrine.
Where was the rest of the Senate? Admittedly, this is the middle of the summer. I’m sure many Senators were back in their home districts fundraising or taking bribes from the lobbyists on K Street, but this is still a pathetic showing. I’m guessing that many of them were too cowardly to show up. They couldn’t dare let their constituents see that they were in attendance.
July 15th, 2007 at 7:08 am
I read on another blog (I don’t remember which) that few Senators typically show up for their daily morning prayer. If true, I suppose that could be encouraging.