A Day of Prayer or “Reason”

By: American Decency Staff

Earlier today I gathered in front of City Hall with scores of others from our small rural community to pray for our nation on this the National Day of Prayer.  The weather was especially cold and blustery for May 1^st – even in Michigan – with sprinkles of rain pelting us at times.  Still we gathered under our nation’s flag – young and old, students from Christian schools, home schools, and public schools, a local judge, stay-at-home moms, area pastors, many faithful aged ones – standing together united in prayer. 

We prayed for our national, state, and local leaders and judges.  We prayed for the Church.  We prayed for the military; the police and emergency workers; for educators; the media; families; the unborn; and more. 

Calling the American people to prayer goes back to before we were (officially) the American people.  Presidents have been calling us to pray since Washington placed his hand on the Bible.  Often, those presidential calls to prayer – at least in earlier years – were not merely seeking God’s blessings, but His forgiveness. 

President John Adams called for a day “of solemn humiliation, fasting, and prayer; that the citizens on that day … call to mind our numerous offenses against the most high God, confess them before Him with the sincerest penitence, implore his pardoning mercy, through the Great Mediator and Redeemer, for our past transgressions, and that through grace of His Holy Spirit, we may be disposed and enabled to yield a more suitable obedience to his righteous requisitions in time to come; that He would interpose to arrest the progress of the impiety and licentiousness in principle and practice so offensive to Himself and so ruinous to mankind; that He would make us deeply sensible that ‘righteousness exalteth a nation but sin is a reproach to any people’ (Proverbs 14:34).”

The evidence is overwhelming that our Founding Fathers firmly believed that it was God who truly “ordained and established” this nation. 

George Washington, in his inaugural address, made as his first official act prayer and “supplications” on behalf of the fledgling country.  His address included:  “… No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency. …”

Washington went on to express “gratitude along with an humble anticipation of the future blessings which the past seem to presage.”

Washington anticipated future blessings, yet as he made that speech on the first day of his presidency, in his wildest dreams he never could have imagined the great blessings that were in store for the United States of America.  He had no inkling of the great heights to which we would reach as a nation – nor the depths to which we would fall. 

Washington did understand, though, as he stated in his National Day of Thanksgiving Proclamation, that “it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly implore His protection and favor …”

However, Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association, is on a quest to abolish the National Day of Prayer.  He claims:  "Our government has no business endorsing faith in prayer …”  Instead he is seeking state and federal governments to replace the National Day of Prayer with “the National Day of Reason.”  It is “reason” he recognizes as “the guiding principle of our secular demoncracy.”

As The Christian Post reports: “The AHA and the Washington Area Secular Humanists began promoting a National Day of Reason as a direct challenge to the National Day of Prayer in 2003. The coalition has been lobbying governors, mayors and city councils in various states to officially recognize the first Thursday of May as a National Day of Reason, with Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee doing so last week.”

Rhode Island’s Governor Chafee issued this National Day of Reason proclamation, stating: 

"Whereas, the application of reason, more than any other means, has proven to offer hope for human survival upon Earth by cultivating intelligent, moral and ethical interactions among people and their environments, … it is the duty and responsibility of every citizen to promote the development and application of reason."

In contrast, Rhode Island’s Charter from 1663 states:  “We submit our persons, lives, and estates unto our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords and to all those perfect and most absolute laws of His given us in His Holy Word.”

In addition, Rhode Island’s state seal, established in 1797, includes the motto:  “In God We Hope.”

What a contradiction we see in these examples from Rhode Island, – “In God We Hope” to “reason, more than any other means, … offer(s) hope.”

How indicative of our nation once birthed in prayer whose path now is seemingly one of reproach, rather than righteousness. 

On this day when many – but far too few – Americans gathered to pray for our nation, as President John Adams prayed,  through grace of His Holy Spirit, (may we) be disposed and enabled to yield a more suitable obedience to his righteous requisitions in time to come …

That once again we as a nation would say, In God We Hope.

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