Did anyone else hear the prayer service on Friday, 1/ 21?

[CBHagman]

I was watching C-SPAN the other night, and they reran coverage of a post-Inauguration prayer service in Washington National Cathedral. Present were members of clergy from various denominations, including Roman Catholic, Episcopal, and Methodist.

Cardinal William Keeler read what I recall was from Matthew 5:43-48 (i.e., the passage where Jesus exhorts us to love our enemies and reminds us that God lets the sun shine and the rain fall on both the evil and the good).

The sermon was given by a Reverend Mark Craig from Dallas, Texas, who seemed to speak very much in the fashion that George W. Bush does -- i.e., repeating the assertion that Americans are compassionate and moral.

While I do believe that most people mean well and will generally come to the aid of their fellow human beings, I am extremely uncomfortable with the administration's emphasis on bragging about American compassion. It made me even angrier to hear Rev. Craig parrot the same words (which may, after all, have come to him in the first place, as the Bushes attended his church back in Texas). Pronouncing the American people moral and compassionate ignores all the times that we emphatically ARE NOT moral and compassionate. To be a Christian is to know that one falls short of God's perfection and that one relies on grace. Why this constant emphasis on bragging?

Then, too, it all gives me the feeling that the Craigs and Bushes of this world are given to proclaiming the American people some sort of superior group. Again, they do not use those words, but that is the overall impression.

However, Bush during his campaign was perfectly content to bash anyone who wasn't in his base or among his supporters. I heard the derision he heaped on liberals, lawyers, Democrats who were not Zell Miller, and so forth.

This hostility paired with a fairy tale view of the Ameircan people strikes me as dangerous.

The link below does not have the complete sermon, but it will give you some idea.

Any experiences/thoughts would be welcome.

www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050121-114915-3315r.htm

A quotation from the article:

"The president seemed particularly pleased by the sermon of the Rev. Mark Craig of Dallas.

"'We are a compassionate people and a loving people, and we are a moral people,' he said as Mr. and Mrs. Bush nodded in approval. 'Our compassion is not liberal; our compassion is not conservative; our compassion is not libertarian.

"'Our compassion is in the very heart and soul of every American citizen," Mr. Craig said."