Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 4, 1995 TAG: 9505040128
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
As they do each year, millions of Americans across the country will gather today in stadiums, statehouses and schools to observe the National Day of Prayer, a growing phenomenon that some hope will become as customary an event as Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July.
But this year, with Congress preparing to debate a school-prayer amendment to the Constitution, the day has taken on an overtly political tone. The National Day of Prayer Task Force, based in Colorado Springs, Colo., has distributed promotional brochures asking Americans to focus prayers on ``our nation's decision-makers'' who are ``taking us in the wrong direction.''
Teachers and students are encouraged to celebrate the Day of Prayer in their classrooms in ways that even the most conservative Christian legal consultants say would violate the Constitution. The Day of Prayer resource kit mailed to more than 10,000 people suggests teachers ``have a prayer walk from classroom to classroom,'' or assign their students essays on ``the ways society has changed since prayer was removed from schools.''
At a time when conservative Christians feel besieged by what they see as a hostile secular government, the National Day of Prayer has evolved into a powerful tool in the campaign to reassert religion in the public sphere.
``Many of our religious freedoms are being stripped by our government since prayer was taken out of schools in 1962 ... [and] we're in what many people call a moral free fall,'' said Shirley Dobson, chairwoman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force. ``Our country stands at a great crossroads, not unlike the crisis that threatened the stability during the Civil War ... and just as our forefathers sought God in times of trouble, so must we seek his face.''
The task force is an independent organization housed in the offices of Focus on the Family, a conservative traditional-values group founded by Dobson's husband, James.
She says ``the National Day of Prayer is not political.'' But others who have watched the event's progress say it has increasingly taken on the tone and rhetoric of the organized religious right.
``This is the most blatantly political use of the National Day of Prayer since its inception,'' said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. ``This year, the National Day of Prayer Task Force has just hijacked the concept and taken it much further into the political arena because they are girding up for the school-prayer-amendment fight to come.''
Congress established the National Day of Prayer in 1952 as an ecumenical expression of national unity. President Reagan further institutionalized it in 1988, declaring that the day should fall on the first Thursday in May.
The event also is an opportunity for politicians of both parties to express public piety.
President Clinton issued a proclamation last month calling on ``every citizen of this great nation to gather together on that day to pray.'' Mayors and governors initiated many of the ceremonies planned for more than 40 state capitols today.
Thousands of the Christians who will worship today at more than 1,000 organized prayer events around the country regard the day as a time for collective spiritual revival. But with the battle over school prayer imminent, the task force is promoting activities that some church-state experts say could further inflame the controversy.
``Ask your superintendent to write a proclamation declaring a `Day of Prayer' in your school,'' the resource kit suggests. ``It could be read during a school assembly or during announcements.
``Have students decorate classrooms to resemble a part of our society that needs prayer (i.e., a home to pray for families, a radio studio for the media). ... Have a prayer walk from classroom to classroom, praying for each.''
Jay Sekulow, chief litigator for the American Center for Law and Justice, the legal arm of the Christian Coalition founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson, said that if public schools adopt these curriculum suggestions, ``you've got serious constitutional problems.'' It could end up in court and, he added, ``I wouldn't defend it.''
by CNB