What’s wrong with making America pray again? Everything.

You’d have to be living in a box to not know about the “God Bless the USA” Bible, sold by the presumptive nominee of a major American political party for 60 bucks a pop. Just for grins, I took the liberty of asking the internet about “free Bibles.” I got more than 90 million hits.

As a math guy, I ‘m pretty confident saying 60 is infinitely more than zero. It’s one thing to pay twice as much more for something than you have to. But infinitely more? Really?

To everyone I know and don’t know who purchased this Bible: When your freedom to buy any religious text you choose, worship as you choose, or pray in a manner of your own choosing becomes threatened by our government, I promise to fight by your side. Like Voltaire, I might disagree with what you say, but I will fight for your right to say it. At least, that is a principle I aspire to.

But that time is not now. Instead, the pendulum is swinging too far in the other direction. I offer as evidence the marketing slogan: “Make America Pray Again”.

Every word of this slogan is wrong. Let’s look at them in order.

“Make”: Making America pray again means forcing her citizens to pray. I just can’t see any other way to interpret the phrase. Which prayers? To which God? How often? In what language? The devil, so to speak, is in the details.

“America”: America is a country, not a person. Countries cannot laugh, cry, jump, swim, crawl, or pray. Only their citizens can do that.

The best countries, I would argue, permit their citizens to pray or choose not to, equally secure in the protection of their rights to do so under the law.

“Pray”: To pray is, among other things, a form of speech, and therefore worthy of protection in any civil society. But what possible meaning or significance could prayer have if prayer is compelled?

According to the latest Pew Research polls, almost 25% of American adults pray “seldom or never”. What will happen to them if America is made to pray again?

But of all the four words, “again” seems to me to be the worst. America has never been a nation where its citizens were made to pray. Freedom of conscience was so important to the first wave of American settlers they left their homes and took a perilous journey across the ocean to exercise it. Anyone who believes otherwise knows little about the origins of the historical documents included with their 60 dollar purchase.

I understand “Make America Pray Again” was chosen more for its similarity to an earlier slogan than as a call for political action. At least, I hope it was. Still, I find the phrase chilling, and profoundly un-American. Consider these words from one our greatest Americans:

“No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.”

That’s from Jefferson’s Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom, curiously left off the list of historical documents you get for your 60 bucks. I wonder why.

Barry Fagin is a National ACLU Award Winner and author of the Radical Center. His views are his alone. Readers can contact Fagin at barry@faginfamily.net.