Van Nuys in Spotlight on National Prayer Day

Throngs of Americans observed the National Day of Prayer on Thursday in small services on city hall steps, at prayer breakfasts and in a nationally televised service from a Van Nuys mega-church.

Although the day--a government-endorsed holiday that increasingly bears a conservative evangelical stamp--has been observed regularly on different dates since the early 1950s, evangelical and Pentecostal leaders have widely promoted the observances since 1988, when Congress and the White House officially designated the first Thursday in May.

Religious right leader James Dobson, founder of the “Focus on the Family” radio program, said more than 20,000 prayer gatherings took place Thursday. Dobson appeared with his wife, Shirley, who chairs a volunteer Day of Prayer task force outside the Capitol in Washington in a live feed to a three-hour program televised nationally from the 8,900-member Church on the Way in Van Nuys.

Entertainer Pat Boone--dressed in sport coat, tie and trademark white bucks instead of his recent record-promoting, pseudo-heavy metal garb--called for repentance and the reading of Scripture. A minister from Chicago criticized cross-dressing NBA star Dennis Rodman and TV comic Ellen DeGeneres, who Wednesday night garnered high ratings with a much-ballyhooed TV show in which her character revealed she was a lesbian, shortly after DeGeneres came out herself.

“The coming out of Ellen should have been our shame rather than a celebration,” said the Rev. Joseph Stowell, president of Moody Bible Institute of Chicago.

The tone shifted shortly afterward, however, as Isaac Canales of Pasadena’s Fuller Theological Seminary lamented the callous treatment of immigrants, homeless and the poor, along with a prevailing rudeness by drivers who cut off other motorists on the freeway or diners who routinely give measly tips to waitresses.

“We have lost respect for each other. Our country has lost the fear of the Lord,” Canales said to applause from the audience of nearly 1,800.

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Because praying for the country is the day’s dominant theme, city halls are common sites for local Day of Prayer ceremonies. Nearly 100 people prayed outside Bellflower City Hall during the lunch hour and about 300 attended an informal breakfast on the steps of Santa Monica City Hall.

One of the Santa Monica speakers was Bob Gay, state coordinator for the Promise Keepers movement, which opens a two-day rally tonight for about 40,000 men at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The all-male evangelical movement stresses responsibility in carrying out the male roles of husband, father and churchgoer.

“This was the best program we’ve had in eight years,” said organizer James Flanagan.

He acknowledged that the gathering had a nearly exclusive evangelical makeup. Roman Catholics have participated in the past. But mainstream Jewish rabbis stay away because members of the proselytizing Jews for Jesus have taken part each year.

The National Day of Prayer has had no effect in the Jewish community, said Rabbi Harold Schulweis of Valley Beth Shalom, the largest synagogue in the San Fernando Valley.

“In Jewish understanding, prayer is critical self-judgment and much more serious than a routinized, public declaration or some kind of magical incantation to solve the nation’s quest for spiritual purpose and moral sensitivity,” Schulweis said.

The major Catholic observance Thursday in Los Angeles was in connection with Law Day, which is observed May 1. Cardinal Roger M. Mahony celebrated Mass on Thursday evening at a church near the Loyola School of Law.