Senate Chaplain Calls Lawmakers Unreasonable and Proud
Wednesday, October 9, 2013 at 12:50PM 
Rev. Dr. Barry Black When the New York Times writes about clergy on the front page (very rarely), it’s only about a scandal or death.
But this week the Senate Chaplain, Rev. Dr. Barry Black , got a page one feature because of the morning prayers he offers at each Senate session.
“Remove from them, O God, their stubborn pride.”
“We acknowledge our transgression, our smugness, our selfishness and our pride.”
“Save us from the madness.”
“Deliver us from the hypocrisy of attempting to sound reasonable while being unreasonable.”
“Forgive them the blunders they have committed.”
What can I say to our international readers about the madness known as the US government shutdown? Headlines use words like “self-inflicted,” “held hostage” “neither side will blink,” evoking very American, violent images. Our history is full of shootouts at the OK Corral and armed embassy standoffs; here we go again. So far the violence is only words, threats. No guns pulled yet.
Although it feels like violence when 9 million mothers and babies in poverty lose their federally funds for healthy food, breastfeeding support and infant formula. Nearly one million government workers are on the job but not getting paid and they’re getting more desperate each day. A few years ago, after a series of postal workers went crazy and violent and murderous, we started saying that a violent worker “went postal.” I think I’ll stay away from the post office this week.
But Rev. Black is calm. Even though he, too, is not getting paid, he daily does the work he likens to being pastor of a large church; he touches the 6000 workers in the Senate with those opening prayers, daily Bible studies, counseling, teaching, leadership training, weddings and funerals for senators and their families and staff.
(He prayed at the funerals of Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford, Rosa Parks. Sen. Edward Kennedy asked him to be on the boat for the burial at sea of his nephew, John F. Kennedy, Jr. He prayed one day in 2009, “Merciful Lord, may the members of your body feel your peace and power today, restrain wandering thoughts and break into pieces those temptations that lead them away from your will…Lord this is the first time in nearly 50 years that the Senate will convene without Senator Edward Kennedy as one of its members. Thank you for his life and legacy. Amen.”)
Interesting guy; first black Senate Chaplain and first Seventh Day Adventist. (For decades it was Episcopalians, then a few Presbyterians and Methodists. Never been a Catholic or Jew or Moslem, although Black invites them to be guest prayers and teachers.) A smart guy; Navy Admiral, former head of Navy Chaplains, Ph.D. in psychology. Private about his own politics, but pushes senators to study religious ethics and to vote with a conscience. Took part in a Capitol Hill “Hoodies on the Hill” protest last year after the murder of black unarmed youth Trayvon Martin for looking threatening in his hooded sweatshirt. He’s also spoken at Evangelical Christian meetings.
Washington old timers lament the end of the era when you could find Republican and Democratic senators who were good friends, went out for drinks after work, rose above self interest to the nation’s good. Rev. Black seems to be trying to change the tone, with a little divine assistance. The Times profile said:
Inside the tempestuous Senate chamber, where debate has degenerated into daily name-calling — the Tea Party as a band of nihilists and extortionists, and Democrats as socialists who want to force their will on the American people — Mr. Black’s words manage to cut through as powerful and persuasive.
During his prayer on Friday, the day after officers from the United States Capitol Police shot and killed a woman who had used her car as a battering ram, Mr. Black noted that the officers were not being paid because of the government shutdown.
Then he turned his attention back to the senators. “Remove from them that stubborn pride which imagines itself to be above and beyond criticism,” he said. “Forgive them the blunders they have committed.”
Senator Harry Reid, the pugnacious majority leader who has called his Republican adversaries anarchists, rumps and hostage takers, took note. As Mr. Black spoke, Mr. Reid, whose head was bowed low in prayer, broke his concentration and looked straight up at the chaplain.
“Following the suggestion in the prayer of Admiral Black,” the majority leader said after the invocation, seeming genuinely contrite, “I think we’ve all here in the Senate kind of lost the aura of Robert Byrd,” one of the historical giants of the Senate, who prized gentility and compromise.
We’re desperate here in America, God. We are ignoring the poor and feeding rich egos. Open our ears to more like Rev. Black.
Copyright © 2013 Deborah Streeter
Reader Comments (1)
Deborah, I had no idea he was a Navy Chaplain, as well as an admiral. Powerful prayer witness at a crucial time. Thanks for this post.