Praying to Legalize Discrimination?

The bad news: Hundreds of pastors in California are calling on their congregations to help pass a ban on gay marriage in California.

The good news: Their main weapon is prayer!

(I'm breaking from my "ethics" series to bring you this breaking story...)

Prayer gives many people comfort and strength, and unlike many Atheists, I have no problem with people who pray in times of trouble. They see it as a connection to God, I see it as meditation, and drawing on their own inner strength. I wish people who get strength from prayer could give themselves more credit for their accomplishments, but if prayer is their way of drawing on that inner strength, what's wrong with that?

On the other hand, I'm offended when people pray for God to intervene, to take sides in our worldly affairs. The idea that God, the purported creator of the Universe, really cares whether the home team wins the football game, is ludicrous. Asking God for help in a war against a Muslim country on trumped-up charges of having weapons of mass destruction is so offensive it's hard to know where to begin.

But when hundreds of pastors advocate prayer as their main tool in a campaign to legalize discrimination against gay couples, I'll encourage them to pray, and pray, and pray some more! Do it all day and night, and since prayer has obviously been so effective in the past (you know, stopping hurricanes, quenching wildfires, starting wars, or was that ending wars?), it will surely work to legalize discrimination in California. Why, if you pray enough, maybe God Himself will come down and cast his vote in the November election!

By the way, those of you who abhor discrimination of all kinds, including against our gay family members and friends, should buy a pair of Levi's jeans today. The Levis company has donated $25,000 to help defeat this offensive amendment to our state constitution.