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"I don't know - it sure sounds like a condemnation of public prayer to me... or at the very least, saying that the ideal form of prayer is alone behind closed doors. Now the specific case we are talking about here is a group of politicians praying in public. Wouldn't the spirit of this passage suggest that those politicans would be better served if they prayed alone rather than as part of a group that has gathered for political purposes?"

The closet is a metaphor used a number of times in the NT by Jesus and others. I can't tell you how to interpret the Word. Heck, I don't know that you even care about understanding it in the first place or if you are one that uses selective quotes, without contetxt, offered by the secularists to support their various positions. Whatever the case, if you're looking for me to disavow public prayer then you're just wasting your time.

Whatever the case, if you're looking for me to disavow public prayer then you're just wasting your time.

My bad. I realize I wasn't clear about that but when I was talking about 'public prayer,' I was referring to people who pray loudly to show the public they are praying - not just regular people who happen to pray in public. Here we have a group of politicians gathered for political purposes praying together when they know that the public is looking at them. It just seems to me that a bunch of politicians praying in this context would be more like those praying loudly for the sake of the public rather than people praying because they are truly interested in prayer. And as I mentioned, if they really wanted just that, why can't they just pray privately?