theDesMoinesPerspective

Iowa Senate ChamberIowa State Legislature class of '09 opened, as it does every year, with prayers by local religious leaders. It almost sounds like the start of a bad joke, "A priest, a rabbi, and an imam were invited to speak the the Iowa Legislature..." But there is no punchline.

While I could make a case that state-sanctioned prayer at the Legislature's opening ceremonies, regardless of how many different religions are represented, violates a couple of the most important amendments to our Constitution, I won't. Instead I will discuss my problems with legislative prayer from a more pragmatic standpoint.

First and foremost, it is ridiculous and grandiose to think, as across the world people die from starvation, children work their fingers to a bloody pulp sewing shoes, and entire towns are eradicated by disease, that any God would spend its time helping the Iowa Legislature debate the finer points of the state gas tax. Any God that would devote time to helping the Iowa Legislature over any number of more pressing world problems doesn't deserve our praise or respect.