To the Honorable Lincoln Davis:

Please vote against the government take-over of health care. Instead, start over with a bi-partisan effort to make incremental changes to our health care realizing that American health care is the greatest, most efficient and most effective health care system in the world.

Please do not let Obama turn this country into a socialist country. Government is not the answer to our problems but government is the problem. Please get government out of our lives.

Mr. David, I am begging you to stand up for freedom loving Americans everywhere. And I am promising you - I, who am 55 years old and have never taken part in a political campaign in my life, am promising to volunteer to campaign against anyone this fall who votes with Obama on the health care issue.

American people are waking up. We cannot turn back the clock and un-elect the socialist Obama. We are stuck with him for 3 1/2 more years. However, we can accomplish much the same thing by voting out of office those who are assisting him in his destruction of America as we know it.

However, that’s a different debate for another day. The argument I’m making is not whether the prayer is unjustified in Biblical terms, but whether it’s unjustified in constitutional terms. The question stands: What rights are being violated by the recital of the Lord’s Prayer? Is this legal strong-arming of Sevier County by an outside group necessary? Or is it simply an attack on Christianity in general?

Perhaps to better answer that question, we should pose another question. Playing off TN4th’s hypothetical scenarios above, would Americans United for the Separation of Church and State intervene if the prayer in question was an Islamic prayer? Or would they actually reverse their stance and throw their weight behind the Muslim’s right to pray in public? Those questions will provide the answer for the original question.

On the other hand, our Lord himself instructed his followers quite well as to public prayer in the general public: He forbade it! Read Matthew 6: 5,6. Christians are not to pray in public to be seen of men. Jesus not only said not to do it, he went on to say that when we prayed we were to enter into our closet and pray in secret.

I know people who never give thanks for a meal at home but if they are in public they feel duty-bound to make a show of their religion by doing so. How can we be so opposite of what Jesus said? It is amazing to me. True believers don’t have to try to make a show of their religion.

So while I resent the constant attacks against Christianity and Christian tradition in our society, I have to agree with some of the comments above regarding praying at public government meetings. To make a reference to our Christian faith during speaking or debate is one thing - forcing someone to participate in public prayer is another. (Isn’t silent respect during a public prayer a type of participation and wouldn’t that be expected?) I think public acknowledgment by a politician of his or her religion is perfectly acceptable. For that politician to expect non-believers to participate in his religion is not. I thought George Bush’s mentioning of his faith was very acceptable and good for us as a people. I thought those who seemed to think that somehow his mentioning of his faith was unconstitutional were ridiculous. However, I would not have thought it appropriate for him to stand reciting long prayers.
Maybe I am just stupid - but I can see both sides of this argument here.

Nothing’s stopping any elected official from saying a silent prayer before he takes part in a meeting or even having the body conduct a moment of silence. Requiring those in the audience to sit through a government sanctioned public prayer seems to me a crass political move designed to convince voters of an office holder’s piety more than to ask for Divine Guidance.

Reminds me of the biblical parable of the Publican….