Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Marking Period 1: Monday #2

This is an editorial of an editorial of the article I summarized last week. I didn't do the original editorial because I a) didn't entirely understand it and b) frankly, the parts I did understand, I didn't agree with.

Cathy Lynn Grossman's editorial starts off asking the audience if they believe evangelicals were snubbed because so many other religions were present at the National Cathedral prayer service in honor of 9/11.  It cites Mollie Hemingway of Get Religion, who doesn't understand why so many of the non-monotheistic religions were represented when various Protestant branches were not.  Grossman mentions that Roman Catholic and Jewish clerics were fine with the set-up of the service, following up with a quote of Hemingway saying her (2.6 million-person) Lutheran congregation avoids mixing with other religions, suggesting that it is silly for Hemingway to be miffed if she didn't want other religions present in the first place.

Similar to Hemingway, current leader of the Evangelistic Association Reverend Franklin Graham is quoted as focusing solely on how Jesus relates to 9/11, not calling for "brotherhood, forgiveness, mercy or interfaith understanding," which was the theme of the interfaith service.  The leader of the fifth largest Protestant congregation ran his own service in protest - despite refusal to pray with other religions.  The head of Hemingway's 2.6 million person church was fired after he participated in the Yankee Stadium prayer session because he was "joining in prayer with pagan clerics," but the decision was overturned; today, he preaches the required message of Jesus and more Jesus.  The editorial wryly ends with a mentioning of Obama's reciting of Psalm 46 at Ground Zero, showing that the evangelicals were technically represented.

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