Adventures in Prayer Land, Part 3

This is part 3 in a 3 part trilogy. Part 1 is located here and part 2 is here.

At dinner, I ate a delightful Philly steak sandwich and was entertained by conversation with members of SHOR. Returning to the hearing room, I handed a yellow piece of paper indicating my interest in addressing the Board to the county clerk, who has a desk to the left of the Board members'. Alex, a tall lanky member of SHOR, did similarly.

At the start of the evening's meeting, it was announced by the Chairman that the Board members would again be entering a closed, executive session at the end of the meeting. While myself and others had been at dinner, the Board had been in closed session discussing, amongst other things, the prayer. Part of the schedule for their closed session reads:

Section 2.2-3711.A.7. Consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to probable litigation, namely, sectarian prayers and the Freedom From Religion Foundation correspondence.

Letter in Roanoke Times: "In America, religions thrive"

As a comment on the situation in Roanoke, Virginia, I submitted a letter to our local paper The Roanoke Times. Today, that letter was finally printed. I am reproducing it here in full:

In America, religions thrive
The Roanoke County Board of Supervisors has long held a sectarian prayer at its meetings. This practice has been challenged by the Freedom From Religion Foundation on behalf of a local complainant ("Group targets prayer at meetings," June 24). At a recent rally, it was expressed that the FFRF was assaulting the religious liberties we value so deeply. But are they?
A little more than half the population of England declares religious affiliation, while in the United States only 15 percent declare no affiliation.
However, there is no separation of church and state in England.
The Anglican Church is deeply attached to the government, with positions in Parliament, religious instruction in schools and anti-blasphemy laws on the books. Why are there so many non-believers in England?
"Separation of church and state" are dirty words to some believers, but entangling government with religion damages both.
This is why many English citizens view their Anglican Church as an outmoded institution.
Meanwhile, American religion is strong, bold and diverse.
This is precisely because we don't entangle our government with our churches.
Protect religious freedom — ask the supervisors to stop breaking the law and end their sectarian prayer practice.

DAN LINFORD
BLACKSBURG

Bafflingly Ignorant Letter in Roanoke Times

On Wednesday, August 10, Ronald Bessette wrote a column (here) for the Roanoke Times claiming that the Doonesbury cartoon from July 10 (available here) erred in its presentation of Creationism as "unscientific and foolish". Bessette claims that, in this process, Gary Trudeau, the Doonesbury cartoonist, "deliberately deceives his audience."

Bessette claims:

"[Trudeau's comic] states that evolution has massive amounts of evidence to support this atheistic idea, yet fails to provide or produce even one statement indicating even a portion of this supposed evidence. This is known as elephant hurling. Where is this massive amount of evidence?"