Middle America's Worldview

I'm all for some diversity, if it brings some form of unification or advancement. However, I am simply not seeing it happening in the area of religion.

I caught wind of a school board allowing female muslim kids one hour of prayer in school. Evidently a substitue teacher had a note to allow one hour of segregated prayer for muslim children. They were allowed in a separate room where no one else could bother them, to pray each day. The controversy is, of course, the separation of church and state. Now, before anyone crys foul over me making that statement, you have to understand something. Yes, I have said before, I think it is the right of American children to be allowed to pray in school. I have always said that, and will continue to say that. However, in this scenario, you have the school mandating their teachers to provide this hour of prayer for muslims, yet not providing the same mandate for judeo-christian children. And of course, the ACLU is quite when the religion in question is not Judeo-Christian. I wouldn't personally have such a problem with it, if the other forms of religion were offered the same treatment.

I was also sent an email (Below) regarding our Senate opening prayer by a Hindu chaplain. You can read the email below.

I am all for listening to everyones side of belief. But the reality is, our founding fathers in the United States, primarily held the belief in one God. That is why our motto is "One Nation under God".

On Thursday, a Hindu chaplain from Reno, Nevada, by the name of Rajan Zed is scheduled to deliver the opening prayer in the U.S. Senate. Zed tells the Las Vegas Sun that in his prayer he will likely include references to ancient Hindu scriptures, including Rig Veda, Upanishards, and Bhagavard-Gita. Historians believe it will be the first Hindu prayer ever read at the Senate since it was formed in 1789.

WallBuilders president David Barton is questioning why the U.S. government is seeking the invocation of a non-monotheistic god. Barton points out that since Hindus worship multiple gods, the prayer will be completely outside the American paradigm, flying in the face of the American motto "One Nation Under God."

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"In Hindu, you have not one God, but many, many, many, many, many gods," the Christian historian explains. "And certainly that was never in the minds of those who did the Constitution, did the Declaration [of Independence] when they talked about Creator -- that's not one that fits here because we don't know which creator we're talking about within the Hindu religion."

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Barton says given the fact that Hindus are a tiny constituency of the American public, he questions the motivation of Senate leaders. "This is not a religion that has produced great things in the world," he observes. "You look at India, you look at Nepal -- there's persecution going in both of those countries that is gendered by the religious belief that is present there, and Hindu dominates in both of those countries."

And while Barton acknowledges there is not constitutional problem with a Hindu prayer in the Senate, he wonders about the political side of it. "One definitely wonders about the pragmatic side of it," he says. "What is the message, and why is the message needed? And will it actually communicate anything other than engender with folks like me a lot of questions?"

Barton says he knows of at least seven cases where Christians have lost their bid to express their own faith in a public prayer.

Zed is reportedly the first Hindu to deliver opening prayers in an American state legislature, having done so in both the Nevada State Assembly and Nevada State Senate earlier this year. He has stated that Thursday's prayer will be "universal in approach," despite being drawn from Hindu religious texts.

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Send an email to your senator now, expressing your disappointment in the Senate decision to invite a Hindu to open the session with prayer.

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