On politicians and prayer

If you don’t have the Snopes’ daily “What’s New?” feed coming in your inbox or your RSS reader, I would heartily suggest you do so. Occasionally political, occasionally disturbing, always entertaining, it’s a good way to watch where the irrational minds of the world happen to be on any given day.

And if there’s one thing the irrational people of the world love, it’s ridiculous stories about the president. There were thousands of emails about Bush doing outlandish things, and now there are emails about Obama doing outlandish things, and they’re almost always false. In this case, it’s about a photo that supposedly shows Obama at an “Islamic prayer day”. The point being, of course, that he scrapped the Christian Day of Prayer in favor of the Islamic one, proving he’s a terrorist or whatever.

What grates on me, though, is when the article touches upon Obama’s decision not to make a public service of the National Day of Prayer. Specifically, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’ response. Emphasis mine.

“Prayer is something that the president does every day,” explained White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, adding that Obama will sign a proclamation to recognize the day. “I think the president understands, in his own life and in his family’s life, the role that prayer plays.”

For all the talk about not having religious criteria for running for office, quite a lot seem to be imposed on our politicians.

I do not believe that Barack Obama prays every day. Nor, for that matter, would I buy that very many people do. The vast majority of people I know, even the self-proclaimed religious ones, can barely dredge up the energy to head down to church more than once a month. We already know they don’t read the Bible, as multiple surveys have shown hilarious ignorance from followers of the book.

So what’s going on? Why would he lie? Simply put, politicians are expected to prove their piety to the nation in order to be deemed acceptable, and poor Barack Obama is subject to far harsher scrutiny on account of his being a) Democrat, and b) brown. With a significant chunk of the nation convinced that the president is secretly a Muslim, he seems to believe that the proper response is to heavily assert his Christianity and “prove” that he’s not a Muslim when the proper response might be to ask why that even matters.

Which brings me back to my main point: it is downright pathetic that, in 2009, our elected officials are still expected to play a game of Who’s More Religious with each other. Recall during the Democratic primary debates when candidates were asked to name their favorite Bible verse. It might have been the singularly most infuriating moment of the whole year. And yet it passed by unremarked by most.

Religion obviously has a bearing on one’s leadership. A man guided by faith will act differently than one who is not. Leaders who believe their paths to be ordained by God tend to be quite separate from those who believe they are responsible for themselves. However, if one wants to see how a man’s religion affects his decision making, ask him to make decisions. This spectacle of proving abstract devoutness accomplishes nothing beyond pandering to the irrational minds who think that someone who doesn’t keep a Bible on their nightstand isn’t a “good person”.

It’s ironic because, as I said above, most people aren’t that religious. Ask the average person to name a favorite Bible verse and if they don’t pick something incredibly obvious (Psalm 23, John 3:16) it’s a rarity. Politicians faking religious credentials for the satisfaction of people who fake their religious credentials. Perhaps “ironic” is the wrong word. “Pathetic”, maybe.

If we as a nation expect to move forward, then forcing our elected officials to parade around with their Bibles a-thumping is the first thing that needs to stop. Maybe they need to follow Christ’s teaching:

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.