Pray Today, Or Else

Unless you’re some kind of weird, out of touch Martian (or other un-American alien), it goes without saying that you’ve been gearing up all week for today’s big National Day of Prayer. We over here at KtB have been locking ourselves in prayer closets, praying just to determine what, on this magic day, we should choose to pray for! Despite being barely constitutional and giving the opportunity for ambitious sons to out-bigot their fathers while simultaneously stoking the fires of Soldiers Gone Wild, the prayer shebang is on, and we’re pumped.

Or we would be. KtB writer Scott Korb really kills the mood with his dueling article about the Day of Prayer’s history over at The Revealer and appearance on BBC4 radio to talk about it. We should have expected this; historical context is always such a killjoy. He writes:

the day has come to feel very small—much smaller, indeed, than in the days before it was law: In the days when it marked the humble founding of a nation, its endurance during civil war, and the fall of presidents. When it acknowledged national sin and asked forgiveness. When it urged us to pray for the poorest of the poor.

Give us a break. Everybody knows God loves the prayers most that are required by law. Such exceeding sweetness of coercion!