Word: christiane
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...both the invocation and benediction (the opening and closing prayers) at his Inauguration. Graham did the same for Bill Clinton in 1993 and again in 1997. The decision to delegate the religious role to Graham seemed a reasonable alternative to filling the stage with an ever-growing number of Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist, Hindu and Baha'i clergy. The famous Evangelist regularly topped the list of people Americans most admired, and he prayed in fairly broad terms, referring just to "God" and using the formulation "I pray" instead of "we pray" to make clear that he was not imposing...
...absence of non-Christian religious leaders was felt even more deeply starting in 2001, when Graham's son Franklin ended his invocation with an exclusive statement: "We ... acknowledge you alone as our Lord, our Savior and our Redeemer. We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit." This was not a prayer offered on behalf of all Americans but on behalf of Christians alone. It bookended George W. Bush's Inauguration with a benediction by Kirbyjon Caldwell that declared, "We respectfully submit this humble prayer...
...wake of the Holocaust and the founding of the State of Israel, to make sure that Jews were represented along with Catholics and Protestants in a national ceremony. Rabbis were included in every Inauguration from 1949 to 1973, with Nixon even tossing a Greek Orthodox prelate into the Judeo-Christian mix. (See pictures of a drive-in church...
...Warren himself encourages the confusion about his politics and agenda. When the Saddleback presidential forum was announced in July 2008, the pastor seemed eager to emphasize that he was not an old-school Evangelical leader obsessed with social issues. "There is no Christian religious test," he told TIME in the days before the event, vowing that questions would center on four areas: poverty, HIV/AIDS, climate change and human rights. On the night of the forum, however, Warren hewed closely to a conservative script, asking the candidates about gay marriage, judges and abortion, and only briefly touching on poverty and climate...
...When Obama asked Warren to take part in the Inauguration, he thought he would get Pastor Rick. And on Tuesday Warren will undoubtedly deliver a blandly optimistic - if explicitly Christian - prayer of the sort that has made him popular with the tens of millions of Americans who have purchased his books. But the uproar that has accompanied his selection suggests that Obama would do well to get to know the other Rick Warren, particularly if his Administration intends to continue an ongoing relationship with the pastor...