Have you heard about the high school girl that had a successful lawsuit to get a prayer removed from the wall of the auditorium of her school where it has hung for the last 49 years? Jessica is a 16 year-old atheist. She was raised Roman Catholic but then quit believing when God didn’t answer a prayer she made for her sick mother. A judge just recently ruled in her favor stating that the prayer hanging in Cranston High School West was unconstitutional and had to be removed. It has caused an uproar in this heavily Roman Catholic, Rhode Island community and on-line as people on both sides lob explosive comments back and forth at each other.
I think it is sad that anyone would be offended and demand that such an innocuous prayer be removed. Forty-nine years ago...
I was disturbed today as I read about a young, eight year-old girl being bullied on her way to school each morning. She was being spit upon, yelled at, and shoved around by others in her neighborhood. What really got my attention was that these weren’t other kids taunting her because she was different in some fashion. These are adults treating her and others like this!
This is happening in Israel. This particular event is occurring in the city of Beit Shemesh, population of about 100,000. The young girl is walking to a Jewish religious girls’ school in her neighborhood. The adults are ultra-Orthodox Jews who call her “a whore” for dressing “immodestly.” By American standard, she is dressing very conservatively.
I noticed that our local County Board has proposed banning the invocation at the beginning of their meetings. Like most decisions, there seems to be some who would favor the ban and some who would oppose the ban. Typically, an invocation would be a short prayer asking God’s blessing upon the discussion and decisions made during the meeting. In our pluralistic society, the prayer would not necessarily be overtly Christian in nature, but by default it often is.
We as a church often resemble a story about a couple who were struggling in their relationship. The wife accused her husband of never telling her that he loved her. The husband responded, “I told you that I loved you when I married you 25 years ago—I’ll let you know if that ever changes.” This couple probably has a lot going for them; they’ve just forgotten to express it to each other in practical terms.
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