Perhaps there is cause to take a hard look at the practice of opening
Burbank's council meetings with an invocation. Based on recent letters to
the editor and comments made to the council, all in response to a
complaint made by a council meeting visitor, mine is not the popular
view. I'm not fooling myself that calls for discussion will be heeded.
Rather, I expect the council to studiously avoid the subject.
Some think I wait until a number of residents have firmly taken a
stand before I come out on the opposite side, a perceived personality
flaw that demands a contrary view. Or, perhaps it's a tactic to cull an
otherwise unmanageable holiday greeting card list. But since the
notorious activist Irv Rubin spoke up and objected to council prayers at
a recent meeting, this is just my first chance to address the topic.
Whether attending or watching council meetings over the years, every
time council members and chamber audiences bowed their heads for a
collective prayer, I've been prodded by a feeling the practice is
improper. And when I've heard the council join in frequent blessings or
requests made "in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ," I thought about
the many in Burbank for whom Jesus Christ is not Lord.
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That pens and word processors are doubtless already busy rebutting
this column is testimony to how inflammatory the subject is. In my
experience, many are convinced that, at worst, it's harmless to usurp the
religious beliefs of others for a brief time. But they're deeply offended
and outraged at suggestions their own beliefs could be usurped for
exactly the same length of time. Some "get it" even less than that. In
defense of prayer, they argue about the burdens on council members, staff
and citizens, and the enormous benefit derived on all fronts when the
community joins to ask a supreme being for help in meeting those
challenges.
Holding that a prayer or blessing is especially important given the
circumstances pretends that prayer is universally endorsed. Those
defenders of prayer in government don't appreciate the diversity of the
community, and that it includes many who either don't believe in any
supreme being, or who find that power somewhere other than in the sliver
of beliefs represented at council meetings. Occasionally taking a break
in the weekly parade of Christian religious leaders handling the
council's invocation to invite a Jewish representative merely pretends
the world has only two religious camps, albeit with some subsets among
the two categories.
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