Opponents Getting Ready to Fight Prayer With Prayer

BY MARK EDDINGTON
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE

    Father in Heaven . . . Hail Mary . . . Amen.
    Such words are common in prayer. But they represent uncommon ammunition for opponents of invocations at Utah government gatherings. And with the Salt Lake County Council's recent 6-3 vote to resurrect prayer at its meetings, critics have plenty of explosive ordnance at their disposal.
    "We haven't decided what we're going to do yet," Chris Allen, head of Utah Atheists, said Tuesday.
    But Allen and other members of his nonbeliever brigade had plenty of ideas at the meeting they convened Sunday at Salt Lake City's Encore Grill. Chief among them: Recruit volunteers to offer the kind of prayers that might give county leaders second thoughts about beginning meetings with invocations.
    Satanists, druids and pagans top Utah Atheists' list of prayer candidates. In keeping with the spirit of the occasion, Allen wants to enlist a member of the American Indian Peyote cult.
    "The County Council should pass the peace pipe amongst themselves," Allen said. "It's amazing what groups we have here . . . that would be considered pagan."
    What's more, Allen insists he is not blowing smoke. He said he has tracked down one Satanist who did not have the courage to be the guinea pig for the group's prayer challenge. But the group already has contacts with plenty more representatives of the heathen horde.
    And Salt Lake County might not be the sole beneficiary. The group wants to spread around their handpicked supplicants -- to civic meetings in South Salt Lake, Murray and possibly even the Legislature. If that is not enough to haunt Utah's praying politicians, Salt Lake City civil-rights attorney Brian Barnard is raising the specter of Tom Snyder.
    Specifically, he wants to revive the mocking prayer Snyder had hoped to offer at a Murray City Council meeting in 1994. The city refused and a federal court upheld that decision, but the jury is still out on the issue in state court. Barnard wants to give his client's prayer -- addressed to "Mother in Heaven" and filled with damning rhetoric about self-righteous and self-serving politicians -- another chance in a new venue.
    Perhaps in Salt Lake County. Indeed, Barnard views the County Council's vote on prayer as a heaven-sent opportunity.
    "God works in mysterious ways," he quipped.
    If Allen and Barnard carry out their plans, Salt Lake County officials may elect to throw the rule book at them. Councilmen David Wilde and Steve Harmsen are drafting a prayer policy they hope will promote diversity while maintaining order and decorum. The county may anoint a prayer coordinator whose job will be to select people to pray and teach them the legally correct method of offering invocations.
    What about Satanists?
    "The purpose of prayer is to be uplifting," Harmsen said. "If the stated objective of a group is to be divisive, we'll probably give them that opportunity. But I don't think we would roll out the welcome mat for them."
    Harmsen said the council is united in its resolve that prayer-givers be a diverse bunch.
    South Salt Lake City Council members are equally committed to diversity, which is why they are slated to review their prayer policy at a work session tonight.
    e-mail: meddington@sltrib.com