We all hoped that 2021 would be a new page, a new beginning and that things would be great, can I get an Amen?

Or in other words, a "So be it."

This week Congress opened shop again, it's okay to groan, I am. I tend to think that if shutting down the government just kept all of our elected officials at home, that would be best.

Case in point.Emanuel Cleaver, a United Methodist Pastor in Kansas City, Missouri opened Congress with a prayer that ended with,'We ask it in the name of the monotheistic God, Brahma, and "god" known by many names by many different faiths.'

'Amen and a woman.'

Sigh.

There is so much to unpack here. Let's start with the term "monotheistic God." Monotheistic God refers to the belief that there is one God. I think most of us in small-town Iowa agree with that. Then in the very next word, he names Brahma, a Hindu god, little "g" and "god known by many names by many different faiths."

I'm not sure what he's saying here. Is he praying to God, Brahma or is it a "fill in the blank deity"? Seriously, choose one. I would think as a Methodist it would be the first, God, with a capital G, but then he kept talking.

Okay, that was a rabbit trail. It wasn't the thing that grabbed my attention the most it was the "Amen and a woman." What in the world does that even mean?

The word "Amen" has nothing to do with men, guys or males. The Latin meaning of the word is "so be it." That's why you close prayer with Amen, you are asking God to let it be so.

Cleaver, for some reason, felt that he needed to add, "a woman" on the end.

I am trying to figure out what possible reason there could be to add "a woman" on to the end of a prayer. The only explanation is to say that the guy had no idea that Amen had nothing whatsoever to do with the male gender. So believing that he tagged "a woman" on to the end of his prayer, just so he could be fair to women.

In English, he ended his prayer with, "so be it a woman," which of course makes no sense whatsoever.

But then a lot of what happens in Washington D.C. doesn't make sense.

Can I get an "a woman?"



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MP January 5, 2021, 1:22 pm Amen!
I read Rep Cleaver's sad and sorry excuse, was that he intended it as a pun to honor the newly elected women in Congress. Shame on him! He made a mockery of the whole affair AND mocked GOD. He calls himself a preacher? Sad.