Resolution on Prayer

Re “God Squad Tells You What to Do,” Column Left, July 6: Robert Scheer chastises Congress for passing a resolution for a day of solemn prayer, by stating it “would order a free people on how to get right with their maker.” Scheer fails to mention that this resolution is nonbinding and nondenominational and not an “order.” This resolution may help or it may not; what is the harm? President Lincoln did virtually the same thing by asking for prayer and fasting in his National Day of Prayer proclamation in 1863, during the Civil War.

The Supreme Court and both houses of Congress begin each day with prayer. The Supreme Court affirmed the right of state legislatures to open their sessions with prayer. In 1952, a joint resolution by Congress signed by President Truman declared an annual national day of prayer. In 1988, the law was amended and signed by President Reagan, permanently setting the day as the first Thursday of every May. Each year, the president signs a proclamation encouraging all Americans to pray on this day.

The real hypocrisy is when President Clinton signs the National Day of Prayer proclamation and Congress passes virtually the same proclamation, Scheer blames Republicans as “self-serving political hucksters.”

SEAN FEE

Granada Hills

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Scheer got it right about the hypocritical Helen Chenoweth (R-Idaho) and her annoying ploy to have the government lead us in a day of prayer. But he got it wrong about Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson would not identify himself publicly as a Christian because he was not a Christian. He was a deist. Deism was a rationalistic 17th- and 18th-century philosophy that specifically denied revelation and held that the universe was governed by natural law (think Newton; think gravity).

Nearly all of the founding fathers were influenced by deism. George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine were avowed deists. Jefferson was a little more restrained. But he wasn’t a Christian and none of the founders envisioned America as a Christian country.

CHARLIE K. MITCHELL

Venice