{"id":10669,"date":"2012-09-19T21:30:09","date_gmt":"2012-09-20T02:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/yimcatholic\/?p=10669"},"modified":"2017-01-24T17:56:27","modified_gmt":"2017-01-24T22:56:27","slug":"university-of-tennessee-to-freedom-from-religion-foundation-continue-to-pray-we-shall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/yimcatholic\/2012\/09\/university-of-tennessee-to-freedom-from-religion-foundation-continue-to-pray-we-shall.html","title":{"rendered":"University of Tennessee to Freedom From Religion Foundation: Continue to Pray, We Shall UPDATED"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nMy local news outlet has the skinny, hot off the wire.<\/p>\n

The University of Tennessee is standing by its stance that its time honored ritual of praying before each football home game does not violates the constitution.<\/p>\n

Last week, a\u00a0national organization called the Freedom From Religion Foundation\u00a0sent a letter to\u00a0the university<\/a>, asking leaders\u00a0to stop the prayers.\u00a0\u00a0 The foundation argued that public prayer before a game doesn\u2019t belong at a public institution, and it violates the constitution.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday,\u00a0UT Chancellor Jimmy Cheek responded to the group with a\u00a0letter,\u00a0stating that it will stand by the tradition of prayer before\u00a0UT events.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis letter is in response to your letter dated September 13, 2012 concerning prayer at University of Tennessee, Knoxville events, including football games.\u00a0 After conferring with the University\u2019s legal counsel, my understanding is that the decision of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in\u00a0Chaudhuri vs. State of Tennessee<\/strong><\/a>, which as you note is binding in Tennessee, specifically held that nonsectarian prayer at public university events does not violate the First Amendment.<\/p>\n

I appreciate your concern about this issue, and I want to assure you that I have given this issue careful consideration.\u00a0 At this time, however, the University will continue to allow prayers before University events with the Chaudhari case.\u201d
\nRead the rest<\/a>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The story has been hitting the air since yesterday, but probably percolating under the surface<\/a> for sometime. Why this matters so much to atheists, I have no idea.<\/p>\n

It all reminds\u00a0me of Ray Bradbury\u2019s short story entitled The Man<\/em>. Do you know of it? I only just \u201cdiscovered\u201d it a week or so ago. I read The Martian Chronicles<\/em>, waay back when (and liked it), but most everything else Bradbury wrote, I never got around to reading.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

Since he passed on recently, I\u2019ve been catching up on his stuff. I read Fahrenheit 451<\/em>, and then after I finished it (loved it!) I picked up The Illustrated Man*<\/em> at the library, having no idea what I was in for. Lots of great short-stories, as it turns out, one of which is this story of a rocket landing on a planet and none of the natives give a rip because they had just been visited by Jesus, and he left everyone feeling strangely fulfilled.<\/p>\n

The Jesus character (who was unnamed, but you got the idea that\u2019s who it was, what with the miracles he performed and all) had a much bigger impact on the populace than the space travelers. I don\u2019t want to spoil the story, but this piece of dialogue stuck with me, and came welling up when I pondered why modern atheists get so bent out of shape these days. One of the crew is sick of hearing the Captain bitch about being upstaged by the God-Man, what with all the healings and miracles. So the captain starts questioning folks,<\/p>\n

He pointed to a woman. \u201cYou.\u201d She hesitated. \u201cYes, you come here,\u201d ordered the captain. \u201cTell me about this wonderful man <\/em>you saw yesterday.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The woman looked steadily at the captain. \u201cHe walked among us and was very fine and good.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat color were his eyes?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe color of the sun, the color of the sea, the color of a flower, the color of the mountains, the color of the night.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019ll do.\u201d The captain threw up his hands. \u2018See, Martin? Absolutely nothing. Some charlatan wanders through whispering sweet nothings in their ears and\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease stop it,\u201d said Martin.<\/p>\n

The captain stepped back. \u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou heard what I said,\u201d said Martin. \u201cI like these people. I believe what they say. You\u2019re entitled to your opinion, but keep it to yourself, sir.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t talk to me this way,\u201d shouted the captain.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had enough of your highhandedness,\u201d replied Martin. \u201cLeave these people alone. They\u2019ve got something good and decent, and you come and foul up the nest and sneer at it. Well, I\u2019ve talked to them too. I\u2019ve gone through the city and seen their faces, and they\u2019ve got something you\u2019ll never have\u2014simple faith, and they\u2019ll move mountains with it. You, you\u2019re boiled because someone stole your act, got here ahead and made you unimportant.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll give you five seconds to finish,\u201d remarked the captain. \u201cI understand. You\u2019ve been under a strain, Martin. Months of traveling in space, nostalgia, loneliness. And now, with this thing happening, I sympathize, Martin. I overlook your petty insubordination.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t overlook your petty tyranny,\u201d replied Martin. \u201cI\u2019m stepping out. I\u2019m staying here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t do that!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCan\u2019t I? Try and stop me. This is what I came looking for. I didn\u2019t know it, but this is it. This is for me. Take your filth somewhere else and foul up other nests with your doubt and your\u2014scientific method!\u201d He looked swiftly about. \u201cThese people have had an experience, and you can\u2019t seem to get it through your head that it\u2019s really happened and we were lucky enough to almost arrive in time to be in on it.<\/p>\n

People on earth have talked about this man for twenty centuries after he walked through the old world. We\u2019ve all wanted to see him and hear him, and never had a chance. And now, today, we just missed seeing him by a few hours.\u201d<\/p>\n

Captain Hart looked at Martin\u2019s cheeks. \u201cYou\u2019re crying like a baby. Stop it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t care.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So it goes, when you have an encounter with he who St. Thomas Aquinas explains \u00a0is the one who awakens our understanding of the dignity of mankind. \u00a0As the Common Doctor states so simply and plainly in De Rationibus Fidei <\/em>(emphasis is mine),<\/p>\n

To excite our love towards God, there was no more powerful way than that the Word of God, through whom all things were made, should assume our human nature in order to restore it, so that he would be both God and man. First of all, because the strongest way God could show how much he loves man was his willing to become man for his salvation; and nothing can provoke love more than to know that one is loved.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Then also, man whose intellect and affections are weighed down towards bodily things cannot easily turn to things that are above himself. It is easy for any man to know and love another man, but to think of the divine highness and be carried to it by the proper affection of love is not for everyone, but only for those who, by God\u2019s help and with great effort and labour, are lifted up from bodily to spiritual things. Therefore, to open the way to God for everyone<\/em>, God willed to become man, so that even children could know and love God as someone like themselves; and so by what they can grasp they can progress little by little to perfection.<\/p>\n

Also, for God to become man gave man the hope of eventually participating in perfect happiness, which only God naturally has. If man, knowing his weakness, were promised the eventual happiness of which angels are hardly capable, since it consists in the vision and enjoyment of God, he could hardly hope to reach it unless the dignity of human nature was demonstrated in another way, namely, by God valuing it so highly that he became man for his salvation. So God\u2019s becoming man gave us hope that man can eventually be united to God in blessed enjoyment.<\/p>\n

Man\u2019s knowledge of his dignity, coming from God\u2019s assuming a human nature, helps to keep him from subjecting his affections to any creature, whether by worshipping demons or any creatures through idolatry or by subjecting himself to bodily creatures through disordered affection. For if man has such a great dignity by God\u2019s judgement and he is so close to him that God wanted to become man, it is unworthy of man to subject himself improperly to things inferior to God.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Perhaps instead of thinking that us hopeless (irony) people of faith need saving from our delusions, the Freedom From Religion types could just see fit to live and let live, instead of attacking that which is unrecognized by them.<\/p>\n

Just a thought, from me, Ray Bradbury, and St. Thomas Aquinas.<\/p>\n

Go Vols (except for when you play the Bruins)!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

UPDATE: Public Prayer at UT Revisted.<\/a><\/p>\n

*Excerpt: \u00a0Bradbury, Ray.\u00a0The Illustrated Man<\/em>. New York: Harper Collins, 1999. Print.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 My local news outlet has the skinny, hot off the wire. The University of Tennessee is standing by its stance that its time honored ritual of praying before each football home game does not violates the constitution. Last week, a\u00a0national organization called the Freedom From Religion Foundation\u00a0sent a letter to\u00a0the university, asking leaders\u00a0to stop […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":140,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,36,41],"tags":[576,31,467,11,528,305,575],"class_list":["post-10669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-living","category-praying","tag-freedom-from-religion","tag-in-the-news","tag-new-atheists","tag-prayer","tag-ray-bradbury","tag-st-thomas-aquinas","tag-university-of-tennessee"],"yoast_head":"\nUniversity of Tennessee to Freedom From Religion Foundation: Continue to Pray, We Shall UPDATED<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"  My local news outlet has the skinny, hot off the wire. 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