The annual National Day of Prayer will be held on May 7th and while it is often viewed as a "high holiday" within evangelicalism in America, I think it is really something that Evangelicals need to avoid and distance themselves from.
Begun as a regular "holiday" by an Act of Congress in 1952, the National Day of Prayer really came into prominence during the administration of Ronald Reagan, who set the "first Thursday in May" as the official day of observance. While it has been challenged several times in the courts, the law establishing it and the official observance has always prevailed.
But what does this day actually celebrate or accomplish? What is seems to be forgotten is that days like this are part of what a several writers, including Robert Bellah, called the “Civil Religion” of the United States. While the Constitution prohibits the United States government from establishing an "official religion" (and subsequent court decisions have prohibited to one degree or another the "promotion" of one religion over any others) since the founding of the country, this "Civil Religion" has been what might be called the "Shadow Denomination" of America, to borrow a phrase from the parliamentary system of Great Britain.
The problem, which many well-meaning Christians don’t seem to understand, is that this “Civil Religion” was never really Biblical Christianity (as opposed to the theonomist perspective, the American Vision group of Gary DeMar, and the majority of the home schooling literature) and America was never a "Christian Nation." Certainly there were many Christians instrumental in the founding of America and the dominant worldview was largely a Puritan influenced, Christian view; but that is not the same thing as a "Christian Nation." From 1783 to about 1929 the Civil Religion was, at varying times, very close to a Biblical Christianity; but even then it was always a pluralistic form of Christianity wherein denominational differences (when those still meant something) and nuanced theological issues (mainly between Calvinistic and Arminian theological constructs) could be set aside with relative safety, embracing the larger purposes of evangelicalism that were held in common.
However, the Civil Religion is not “fixed;” that is, it has no absolutes that it can anchor to and changes with the overall changes of societal norms. It is true that the Civil Religion was, fairly well settled within the larger norms of evangelicalism and decidedly excluded Catholicism, Orthodoxy, the various American cults (e.g. Mormonism), and all non-Christian religions. However, between 1920 to 1950 the norms changed and so did the Civil Religion and the connection between it and Biblical Christianity began to erode.
While I am not one to "bash" Billy Graham, who accomplished much for the Kingdom in his lifetime; I believe it is still true that for better or worse, he was the national pastor of the Civil Religion (even as Billy Sunday and Dwight Moody perhaps had been before him); and as he expanded the participation in his crusades from the 1970’s onward to include Catholicism and Orthodoxy, the Civil Religion itself was altered and realigned. Now we have the inclusion of Judaism and normative Islam into the Civil Religion. By normative Islam I mean non-extremists who are brought into the fold of civil religion as a way to give them a platform to promote this “safe” Islam as over against the radical and dangerous Wahhabism.
The Civil Religion was never Biblical Christianity, but for a long time Biblically minded Christians could participate in the meetings and events of the Civil Religion in good conscience. However, for me, that is no longer possible. Were I preaching or speaking about the National Day of Prayer, I would probably preach something along this line, pointing out the difference between Biblical Christianity and the Civil Religion of America. The former has a fixed guideline, The Scripture and the "faith once for all delivered to the saints." The later is phenomena of culture and by definition derives its foundational principles from the will of the collective whole. It is the ad populum fallacy presented as a systematic theology.
Of course, some Christians and churches want to "use the day" and take advantage of its notoriety to promote the Biblical concepts of prayer. But what is the true and Biblical relation of the Christian to the government? Here are some basic principles that the New Testament presents:
For churches to identify with the National Day of Prayer, however they may try to nuance that participation, is largely an approach which only continues to confuse the difference between Biblical Christianity and the Civil Religion of America.
There is also a separation from ungodliness and false religion that must also be remembered. Christians in the early church would not even toss a bit of incense on the altar to the "Genius of the Emperor" and I seriously doubt that they would have engaged in the recitation of the flag salute, another common ritual of the Civil Religion today. For too long I think American Christians have lived with the illusion that the Civil Religion and Biblical Christianity were one and the same. They aren't, they never were, and the efforts of some well-meaning Christians to bring the Civil Religion back to a closer conformity with Biblical Christianity are simply a misdirected waste of time, effort and resources.
Why not participate in the National Day of Prayer? Because, it’s now largely an exercise that involves oneself in the rituals of a false religion.
I would like to say that I had some really well conceived reason for waiting to talk about the new baseball season until after the first week of play, but the truth is I was just too busy with other things to post something last week.
In terms of actual baseball nothing that happened this week would alter any predictions that I made, with the exception of the tragic death of Nick Adenhart at the hands of another mindless drunk driver (who hopefully will never see another day out of prison in his life) and the effect that will have on an already short-staffed Angels rotation. If they Angels cannot get some quality starts from a patchwork rotation until their injured starters get back they could be in early trouble. Weak starting pitching will pile up innings out of the bullpen which will take a toll later in the season. Perhaps the Angels will sign Pedro Martinez if Pedro relents a little on the delusional amount of money he thinks he should receive to sign.
I spent the bulk of my LAPD career working in traffic accidents and I have no sympathy at any level for people who operate vehicles under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs. I was nearly killed by a DUI driver when I was in college and spent the next 13 months of my life in a cast on on crutches; which makes me one of the more fortunate victims of self-centered, non-thinking buffoons who endanger hundreds of people for every mile they drive.
The DUI problem in professional sports is real (I also know this from experience) and probably more accute in baseball. Bud Selig, the baseball commissioner, instead of largely wasting time and money combatting steroids, HGH, and other "performance enhancers" (which no objective examination would show any enhancement in baseball); he would perform a greater service in establishing some harsh penalties for any baseball personnel, from owners down to bat boys, who are arrested for DUI. Cutting down that problem would actually save lives.
Well back to the actual season. I'm mainly only interested in the National League West, since that's where the Dodgers play. But here are my predictions for the 2009 season:
American League
The Dodgers come out of the first week 4-3, with two of the loses games they should have probably won. One thing is fairly clear in watching the games so far. This is a team that should not have problems scoring runs. The 3-8 hitters could all hit 20+ home runs and I am really looking for Matt Kemp and James Loney to have break out years. Except for Manny in left field, this is as solid a defensive team as there is in the National League. Casey Blake at third is not a statue, but he doesn't cover a lot of ground; but, he doesn't make a lot of errors either.
What I am concerned about with the Dodgers is their bullpen. Wade, Kuo, and Broxton will hold it together, but the others are not impressive so far. I would expect Mota to be replaced by Scott Elbert pretty soon, or perhaps Eric Stults will stay up when Kuroda comes off the DL. The signing of Ohman perhaps makes some sense, but he's clearly not ready and probably should have been sent to AAA or had his spring training extended. I don't think Belisario is quite ready yet either. I am also a little concerned about their bench depth. They have opted to keep Juan Pierre as their 4th outfielder, which to my mind is absurd. Pierre can't play defense and is limited to only center and left. Perhaps they'll figure a way to trade him soon, but they'll certainly have to come up with a better option. The other bench players, DeWitt, Lorreta, and Mientkiewicz give Torre plenty of options there (actually DeWitt and Lorreta are probably better outfielders than Pierre).
The Dodgers play a remarkable schedule almost entirely against divisional teams until the second week of May. They only have a series with Houston and a home series with the Nationals before May 10th. If they can get hot at all, they could get a solid hold on first place pretty early. The NL West is not a strong division again this year. It won't be the worst, I think that title will go to the AL Central. San Diego, despite starting well, may well lose 90+ games this year. San Francisco won't be much better and won't be a .500 team. Arizona now has Brandon Webb on the DL to start the season and is not as good a team as they were last year even with him. The Rockies are just the Rockies, they are not as strong this year either.
Home opener Monday against the Giants. Sweeping the Giants would make a nice start to the homestand.