In 2008 The Freedom From Religion Foundation sued the US Federal Government over National Prayer day, arguing that the ability of the government to assign a day to prayer amounted to an endorsement of religion, and that it could cause harm to those who do not believe in deities by stigmatizing them.
They lost on appeal as not having standing, the court ruling that no requirements were in place to pray. Any individual could not participate.
The impulse for atheists is to object to such promotions on national scale, as such actions subordinate the people to whatever deity they imagine is real. The power of a democracy, in this case the American Republic, is the willingness of the people to come together and solve our problems with solutions built on reason and practical value. Prayer on the other hand, may give people the illusion that god (whatever that is) will take care of it. By surrendering our responsibility as citizens to the hand of providence we are in reality shirking our duty and simply accepting whatever occurs; whether that happens by chance or by the control of those who would abuse our trust for their own gain.
The atheist sees that in a democracy, the people are responsible for making things right and that to submit ourselves to the divine is futile. After all, the same god that spared the house from the tornado also brought that tornado. To pray for god to protect one from a pandemic seems to ignore why we accept a god who brought that pandemic in the first place.
Epicurus once asked:
“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
This question has never been satisfactorily answered. The default for those who believe is to advise that god works in mysterious ways. This empty platitude illustrates the weakness of the belief. It is surrendering to imagination when reason fails to provide answer.
On the National Day Of Prayer, people across the country will bow their heads and, while invoking the power of their preferred supernatural being(s), wash away some of their fears of what might happen, and relinquish some of their responsibility to affect that future.
And what they pray for will vary. Some will pray for personal guidance, some will pray for those who lead, some will pray for divine intervention, and some will pray for support of some endeavor they intend to undertake (whether that be for good or ill.)
But today I will join them.
Of course I do not believe any gods exist, and so I do not pray to, but rather for.
I will pray for peace. I will pray for my fellows of this land, that they may come to see their duty to each other. That they may accept the hard choice to engage with each other to make this a better world. I will pray not that others give up their gods, but that they see that their gods would want them to help heal the world. I will pray that people will use their own minds to see others as their fellows and not as their enemies. To find the common ground we share, and to see how much better it will be for them if everyone shares in the bounty that we (whether or not a god is behind it) have brought forth.
But as I pray I know that the only one my prayer will effect is me. But perhaps I too need to practice what I ask others to do. Perhaps in this prayer I gain some strength for my efforts at helping others.
The Stoics understood that we can only control our own actions. We cannot control what others do, but only how we respond.
It may be that my view of prayer is different from that of others. Perhaps it should be called meditating, or positive affirmations, or even just hope. But if my desire is for this country to come together and share in the efforts at solving the problems we face – that the world faces, then it falls on me to do my part in the coming together with others.
Today others are praying. So today, I too will pray.