Posted on 05/31/2011 9:59:18 AM PDT by rightistight
Pastor Scott Rainey planned to deliver a prayer at a Memorial Day ceremony yesterday. There was only one problem: that prayer mentioned Jesus.
To the vast majority of Americans, saying the name Jesus during a prayer would not only be all right, but almost required. However, the Dept. of Veterans Affairs and the Houston National Cemetery, and cemetery director Arleen Ocasio, found the name offensive and moved quickly.
“Our national cemeteries are places for all veterans of all beliefs,” Ocasio wrote in a letter to Mr. Rainey. “We cannot be exclusive at a ceremony meant to be inclusive for all our nation’s veterans.” She added that he had to remove the name of Jesus, "or he would not be allowed to pray."
She wrote in reference to the last line of Rainey's prayer: “in the name of Jesus Christ, the risen Lord.”
Rainey was shocked by the letter and Ocasio's demands. “I have never said a prayer in my life where I didn’t end it by saying ‘in the name of Jesus Christ, I pray, amen,’” he stated.
(Excerpt) Read more at punditpress.blogspot.com ...
Everyone needs a rabbi, like Rabbi Joshua (aka Jesus), and that includes Mrs. Ocasio.
Rest of the story, May 27:
A federal judge ruled Thursday that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs can’t keep a pastor from saying “Jesus Christ” in a Memorial Day prayer at Houston National Cemetery, The Houston Chronicle reports . “The government cannot gag citizens when it says it is in the interest of national security, and it cannot do it in some bureaucrat’s notion of cultural homogeneity,” U.S
http://spacecoastsentinel.com/tag/arleen-ocasio/
Did your Jewish friends vote for Obama? How do they like him now that he’s totally sold out Israel?
Actually no, they did not, so I can’t even answer the second part of your question. The only folks I know personally who voted for Obama, are WASP women, for what’s it worth.
bump
You have it right.
If I go to a ceremony, and there is a wicca officiant there, and they make some reference to wicca, that’s my problem, not theirs. This is who they are and what they do.
I grew up in a Jewish area. In school we never had problems with Christian or jewish things. We sang a religious Christmas carol for the winter concert and a hanukah song. I think kids are stunted when all reference to peoples religion is taken out.
Suddenly diversity isn’t supposed to be diverse?
Do those jerks want the prayer replaced with an all inclusive and non offensive form letter?
She forgets who the audience of the prayer. By removing Christ from the prayer, the audience no longer hears her prayer, but instead it becomes a vain mumbling, excluding all who think the prayer from being heard by God.
I’ll bet that over 98% of the headstones have crosses. Moreover, in my experience religious Jews, who are a small minority of Jews, don’t much mind. The secular Jews are usually th eones who are upset. Let them be upset.
Glad sanity prevailed (post 22), but their will come a time when speaking the name of Jesus will get you beheaded or stoned, just as it did in ancient times.
As for this situation, don’t ask a Pastor to speak if you don’t want him to mention Jesus. Ask a Unitarian... I’ve heard they pray “to whom it may concern”!
Our experiences differ markedly.
I have a hunch that most folks have few problems with a generic prayer. I’ve seen about a million at different events, and it never seemed to me like the crowd was getting agitated.
Then again, I might just be a poor Christian, since I’ve prayed at the temple on the invitation of a Jewish friend.
>>I have a hunch that most folks have few problems with a generic prayer. I’ve seen about a million at different events, and it never seemed to me like the crowd was getting agitated.<<
No, if you pray a watered-down prayer to a non-specific deity that “everyone can agree on,” then you have prayed to nothing. Of course no one will be offended. This is known as the Football Game God, the one people bow their heads and pretend to pray to before a football game.
Very politically correct and non-offensive.
However, most of us are sick to death with all the PC crap being shoved down our throat, and having our rights squelched by self-appointed tyrants such as mentioned in the article.
Feel free to roll over and take it. The rest of us won’t.
In order for me to "Roll over and take it." I'd have to first be offended, and I'm not offended.
However, most of us are...
I'll stop you right there. I don't believe that you're speaking for most.
Don’t let the idiots screen your speech!
If they insist, ask them which Gestapo address to send it to?
Philippians 2:9-11
"Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:
That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
Acts 4:12
"Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved."
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