National Day of Prayer

Today is the National Day of Prayer.

 I don't know if the media is talking about this. I don't usually watch the news, since I have young children, and I've decided that you just can't watch the news if you have young children. I know I haven't seen it on the headlines on my email server. I know that I did see it on the facebook page of the parochial school that I attended until sixth grade.

I know past presidents have made a point to mention the National Day of Prayer. I hope President Obama will, too. I suspect that if he does, though, he will somehow mention it carefully. That is not a statement about politics, though I'm sure some will take it that way.

That's a statement about society.

We don't want to talk about prayer much. We're too afraid we may offend someone. We don't want to be seen as pushing our values unto others. Because, you know, values are just so...passe.

Kind of like prayer.

And that is exactly why we so desperately need this day.

We used to watch the news and think how fortunate we were to live in this country, and not those other countries. The ones that were dealing with hatred, and wars, and atrocities.

And yet, people are killing people every day in this country. Over tennis shoes. Over drugs. Over absolutely nothing at all.

People are hating each other every day. On the internet. On the highways. In their homes.

Atrocities? I'd say we have our share.

Rapists who are practically celebrated by the media. Soldiers sharing their Christian beliefs being threatened by the military. People who seek--and find--shelter and safety in this country, so that they can ultimately build a bomb and murder innocent people.

A National Day of Prayer?

Yeah, I think we could use that.

In fact, we could use it every day.