At his U.S. News and World Report blog, Dan Gilgoff breaks a story about how President Obama's public rallies, like the ones he held recently in Elkhart, Indiana, and Fort Myers, Florida, to sell his stimulus plan, have opened with a prayer vetted by the White House. Gilgoff writes that the administration "may have skirted controversy by scheduling the invocations to be delivered before the president arrives at the events—and before national cable network cameras start rolling." The White House, he reports, said that the practice has been "standard since the campaign."
Except during the campaign, Obama was not yet president of the United States, and the White House wasn't giving its stamp of approval for the invocations. Americans United for the Separation of Church and State's Barry Lynn told Gilgoff, "The only thing worse than having these prayers in the first place is to have them vetted, because it entangles the White House in core theological matters."
--Sarah Posner
