Three religious protesters were arrested after Hindu Chaplain Rajan Zed read the first ever Hindu prayer at the Senate's daily opening prayer. Zed began the prayer, "We meditate on the transcendental glory of the Deity Supreme, who is inside the heart of the Earth, inside the life of the sky and inside the soul of the heaven. May He stimulate and illuminate our minds." Not soon into his prayer, a group of people began shouting "this is an abomination". One protester was heard chanting "Lord Jesus, forgive us father for allowing a prayer which is an abomination in your sight...You are the one, true living God."I have a few things that bother me about this event. First, I had no idea there was even a daily opening prayer in the U.S. Senate meetings. I do not support public prayer of any kind, and I do not believe it has a place in government. Which leads to my second point, expression of religious beliefs in these places only distracts from real issues. There is a time and place for religious expression, and I can not see how government complements religion. It only serves to divide people on issues that do not matter. Also, I find when Americans support religious freedoms in government, what many of them actually mean is they support Christian freedoms in government. Religious intolerance--period--is a disappointing thing to see. Unfortunately, there will always be elitists!
2 comments:
I can see your point. But on the other hand it seems to me that the only religions allowed (meaning tollerable) are non-christian. Christianity is going the way of the Jewish religion in centuries past. Christians can't have anything religious of theirs in public but everyone else can. The true shame is that it should be everyone or no one. Not just some.
>The true shame is that it should be everyone or no one.
From the perspective of Democratic theory and from the legal perspective, this is correct.
>But on the other hand it seems to me that the only religions allowed (meaning tollerable) are non-christian. Christianity is going the way of the Jewish religion in centuries past. Christians can't have anything religious of theirs in public but everyone else can.
I don't think there is any evidence to support this claim. The story Alexandra talks about is a good example. Every session of Congress begins every day with a prayer, almost universally given by a Christian. Congress also has a chaplain on salary, as does much of the military and almost all state and local governments. Almost all of these chaplains are Christian. Christians also have complete protection in practicing their religion on their own terms in public or private. Many government buildings, such as the Supreme Court, also have Christian imagery on them (such as the Ten Commandments).
The only time there is a limitation is when government spending or property is invovled. The Constitution prohibits -- and has always prohibited favoring one religion over another or favoring religion in general over non-religion. There are instances where Christian symbolism is prohibited, but it is only when all other religious symbolism is prohibited as well.
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