Topic: courtesy and prayer

[amysrevenge]

Hmmm...  You know enthusiastic chanting has always made me squirm.  ...  So maybe this is why I turned away from my faith. 

This was a big part of it for me too.  The difference between "Peace be with you"/"And also with you" and "burn the witch" is one of degree, not of nature.

[MikeHz]

What I hate is when I get dragged into a church for some reason or other, such as a wedding or funeral or something. Then, it's "up, down, stand, sit, kneel." I never know whether to follow the crowd or just sit there like a dumb ass.

[EhJayArr]

Tough to toe the line between respecting others and standing up for yourself.

In these situations, I try to be respectful by not disrupting the prayer at all, but I don't stand or hold hands or stop eating. If people want to pray, super. Don't expect me to pretend like I'm taking part, though.

I also enjoy looking around a room during a prayer to see who looks disinterested...

[lukebourassa]

Tough to toe the line between respecting others and standing up for yourself.

In these situations, I try to be respectful by not disrupting the prayer at all, but I don't stand or hold hands or stop eating. If people want to pray, super. Don't expect me to pretend like I'm taking part, though.

I also enjoy looking around a room during a prayer to see who looks disinterested...

I feel this way. I'm the kind of person who wants everyone to get along. I'll pick fights about facts and terrible music, but I tend to respectfully allow others to pray, etc. At the same time, I don't tend to be in a scenario where a whole room full of people are praying and I'm feeling weird.

No matter what, the majority will always makes the minority feel uncomfortable, whether they mean to or not.

[Vincegamer]

What I hate is when I get dragged into a church for some reason or other, such as a wedding or funeral or something. Then, it's "up, down, stand, sit, kneel." I never know whether to follow the crowd or just sit there like a dumb ass.

I sometimes get dragged into church by relatives and I just sit through the whole thing.

[Eternally Learning]

What I hate is when I get dragged into a church for some reason or other, such as a wedding or funeral or something. Then, it's "up, down, stand, sit, kneel." I never know whether to follow the crowd or just sit there like a dumb ass.

I sometimes get dragged into church by relatives and I just sit through the whole thing.

The worst is getting dragged to a Catholic mass with my in-laws.  My wife's immediate family is cool, but her grandmother, while unbelievably sweet, is super-catholic.  The communion is kind of hard to abstain from subtly, so I end up doing it because I don't want every conversation with her until her death to be about why I'm not a good catholic boy. 

[EhJayArr]

What I hate is when I get dragged into a church for some reason or other, such as a wedding or funeral or something. Then, it's "up, down, stand, sit, kneel." I never know whether to follow the crowd or just sit there like a dumb ass.

I sometimes get dragged into church by relatives and I just sit through the whole thing.

The worst is getting dragged to a Catholic mass with my in-laws.  My wife's immediate family is cool, but her grandmother, while unbelievably sweet, is super-catholic.  The communion is kind of hard to abstain from subtly, so I end up doing it because I don't want every conversation with her until her death to be about why I'm not a good catholic boy.

I got tired of the charade, so (much to my somewhat Catholic) mother's chagrin, I came out to my VERY Catholic grandmother as an atheist. Got the standard "worried for you, want to see you in heaven, will be praying for you" speech at first, but since then have had some really nice conversations with her about what each of us believe.

[seamas]

Funny thing about communion.

My mother would throw a fit if she saw me take communion (as an adult).
Unless she was aware of me doing confession / act of contrition /penance first.

She was more irked by people taking communion who weren't "absolved" than she was about people abstaining.

Growing up I think it was taken a bit more seriously by the congregation. At least in my parish. It wasn't uncommon to see regular Mass goers abstain from communion--probably because they didn't want to receive communion until after they do confessions or something.


I have luckily never encountered any "grace" or prayer in or at any professional or work environment.
I think the NYC tri-state area being so diverse has a lot to do with it.


The only time I go to any religious institution is for Weddings, first Communions, Bar/Bat Mitzvahs and funerals.

I just stand when people stand, sit when people sit. If at a Mass I make sure the person behind me can kneel comfortably.


The last thing I went to was a 2.5 hour long Bat Mitzvah.
jeesh.
 Took forever.
I don't know what the hell the deal was--It was reform Judaism too. I've been to orthodox ones that were over in less than half that time. Thank Xenu they serve food right afterwards. I was starving.

[postwaste]

I went to a union school last month.  There is normally a prayer to start the whole thing, but its usually pretty stripped down. I usually stay seated or slip in after. The lady that said it there started with "Let us acknowledge the only man who can save us, the only man who can save the Post Office, our lord and savior Jesus Christ, We all know this.." She went on like this for some time.  My first thought was "If only Jesus can save the Post Office, why are we wasting our time trying?" As it went on I got mad.

I got up and walked out.  After I had calmed down, I spoke to our National Agent.  I don't know if it will help, but the next time, I may not be able to avoid a rebuttal. I'm finding it harder to sit quietly in situations like this.

As far as prayer in someone's home, I subscribe to "My house, my rules".  When I visit a family member who says grace or something like it, I will take a hand and sit quietly.  I think it would be rude to otherwise.  When family members come to my house, there is no prayer.

Respect is a two way street.

[AxeGrrl]

I went to a union school last month.  There is normally a prayer to start the whole thing, but its usually pretty stripped down. I usually stay seated or slip in after. The lady that said it there started with "Let us acknowledge the only man who can save us, the only man who can save the Post Office, our lord and savior Jesus Christ, We all know this.." She went on like this for some time.

Again, it's very surreal for me to hear of such situations like this.  Things like this simply do not happen where I'm from/live.

As far as prayer in someone's home, I subscribe to "My house, my rules".  When I visit a family member who says grace or something like it, I will take a hand and sit quietly.  I think it would be rude to otherwise.  When family members come to my house, there is no prayer.

Respect is a two way street.

Bingo. I couldn't have said it any better.

[Bill D]

You know, it's fascinating hearing these things......this must be an American thing, eh?

Because I have literally never witnessed any work meeting, any group event (whether work-related or not) that began with any type of prayer.  NEVER.  In my entire life.

This.  I've worked 8 years in Canada and 7 in the U.S.  This stuff was common in the mid-west and southern U.S., but I would kind of  like to see what would happen if someone started a prayer at a Canadian business function;   I am sure that people would not be respectful, including other religious people; public displays of religion are simply unacceptable by our societal standards.

Though I  suppose I can kind of guess what the reaction would be based on a similar experience:

The weirdest experience in my career occurred when an American senior engineer came up to our Canadian office for a meeting.  At lunch (in the meeting room) he made some sort of "we all need to be right with God" type statement, to which this room full of Canadian engineers reacted by just staring at him as if he had just completed a diatribe on his sympathy for Hitler.  They were simply stunned. 

I jumped down his throat and halted the meeting for two hours while we debated Evolution, God, Global Warming, source of morals etc.  I know my co-workers would rather I had just let it go because this guy is the expert on the technology we were discussing and we only had him for a few hours...yet, not one person asked me to stop and I was the most junior person by probably 20 years.

Yes, I'm still employed. 

[WC]

I would give Canada my first born, if I would be permitted to immigrate. Whatever Canada wants, anything. I will do anything. ANYTHING. Hell, my lunatic winger gobshite Rush-a-file hate radio grandmother immigrated from Toronto to Salt Lake City. It's only fair you let me in. Eye for an eye.

[Hanes]

I would give Canada my first born, if I would be permitted to immigrate. Whatever Canada wants, anything. I will do anything. ANYTHING. Hell, my lunatic winger gobshite Rush-a-file hate radio grandmother immigrated from Toronto to Salt Lake City. It's only fair you let me in. Eye for an eye.

Wouldn't it be awesome if we could trade like that?

[AQB24712]

Your firstborn, Wicked C?  Very funny. 

I haven't been to a meeting or public event that started with a prayer for some time, but at my last high school class reunion (in southern West Virginia), we asked one classmate to say grace before dinner.  She'd been involved in planning for earlier reunions, but not this one, and we thought it would be nice to give her a role that she'd enjoy.

I winced when she offered her thanks for the good weather, everyone's health, etc., "in Jesus' name," but then, she's a big ol' thumper, everybody knows she's a big ol' thumper, we've all known each other for **mumble** years, and everybody just sorta flowed with it.  But I guess that's different from an event without that kind of familiarity.

I pray over one meal per year.  I'm not so much of a cook, but I always have my friends Cheri and Vicki over for Xmas dinner, which always begins with my intoning, "Dear Jobu, please don't let me poison my friends" and their enthusiastic "amen." 

And the last church service I attended was a funeral mass, through which I sat quietly.

[Bill D]

I would give Canada my first born, if I would be permitted to immigrate. Whatever Canada wants, anything. I will do anything. ANYTHING. Hell, my lunatic winger gobshite Rush-a-file hate radio grandmother immigrated from Toronto to Salt Lake City. It's only fair you let me in. Eye for an eye.

Give us back Shatner and we'll talk.