Pray Me a River

God bless our President.  He surely needs it.  And apparently he knows it.  According to the NYT, people at the White House are organizing a prayer vigil in coordination with "dozens of leaders of nonprofit organizations that strongly back the health [care] law," in hopes that it will help support the law as the Supreme Court's review of it draws near.


In other news, the Koch brothers have organized a Vigil for Victory in their lawsuit seeking control of Cato.  "We are using a libertarian prayer platform," David explained.  "Buddists, Catholics, Wiccans, Lutherans, Mormons, Muslims—we have a few of all of those.  Basically, any religion that goes for human autonomy is OK with us.  We even got Steve Jobs' advisor, Kobun Chino Otogawa, to come and pray over the briefs.  He did this pose where he addressed the Sunyata through the intercession of Dhana Naukariyom ... Kinda cool."

Charles Koch declined to comment.

The Koch's decision to bolster their lawsuit with angelic assistance has met with little reaction, except among the most left-wing of new sources.  The Huffington Post published a full-length article on the Vigil ("Holy Hogwash: Koch Brothers Have Heavenly Helpers?"); but the development has otherwise been ignored by the mainstream media.

The White House's similar strategy, however, has sparked a rash of comments from Catholics who oppose the recent HHS mandate; and a rash of imitations by politicians seeking to wrest Obama's oval office seat from him next November.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is said to have organized overnight his own team of "Prayer Core Players" to pray for his campaign.  When asked whether the rumor was true, Romney laughed.  "I can't leave it all up to the money, y'all," he said.  "We are laying siege to heaven."

That latter phrase caused some trouble for Romney the next day when an unidentified Santorum team member asserted that the phrase was a plagiarism from a Catholic author.

"If Romney wants to use his Latter Day Saints to pray for his success, that's just fine," the supporter said.  "But stealing from Louis de Wohl—that's just unfair.  Really unfair."

Gingrich responded to the Romney campaign's effort in his own way, spinning out five YouTube videos defending the Catholic doctrine of intercessory prayer.  "It's insane that the media are attacking us for believing in this," he said.  "Just insane.  But really fashionable.  Like Callista's hair."

Ron Paul is said to have grinned when told about the controversy.  "This just proves what I've said all along," he said.  "Santorum is a fake Catholic.  Everyone knows that Louis de Wohl is no saint."

But if prayer is becoming chic for presidents and would-be presidents, there is one branch of government that remains impervious to its blandishments.  Justice Scalia, when told about the Obama team's intercessions, spread his hands.

"They can pray all they like, they can go down on their knees, but we are not reversing Hosanna-Tabor," he said.  "Or Heller, for that matter.  They're going to have to pry that opinion out of my cold, dead hands first."

Clarence Thomas declined to comment for this article.

Alito, when told that Obama was now in favor of praying in public, is asserted to have mouthed the words "Not true."

When Archbishop Dolan heard the news, he smiled.  "I see the President is still 'working out the wrinkles'," he said.  "Well, I suppose he can have his 'freedom of worship'.  But I have to confess that I got my Irish up a little when I heard that Sister Keehan was the only Catholic rep on his prayer team."