The original core text of the Constitution of the United States of America promises that there shall be no religious test for public office. The very first clause of the first amendment to the Constitution pledges that Congress shall not take action to establish a government religion.
Both of these standards for separation of church and state are dashed to pieces by the establishment of an official, government-paid position in the US federal government of Chaplain of the US House of Representatives. The Chaplain of the United States House is not a voluntary position. The Chaplain is a federal government official equipped not only with a very generous salary, but also with a government office and a large budget and professional assistants.
The public office of US House Chaplain is only made available to Christians. There has never in the entire history of Congress been even one non-Christian US House Chaplain. Once, a few years ago, a US Representative requested that a Hindu brahman be allowed as a guest to give just one invocation on one morning in the place of a Christian prayer. The ceremony was interrupted as many Republican members of Congress loudly stood up and burst out of the room in protest. Never again has such a thing even been attempted.
The entire US House of Representatives is required to pause its business to observe the Christian religious rituals officiated by the Chaplain, whether members are Christian or not. In both form and content, these rituals are designed to undermine democracy and promote an ideology of extremist Christian Nationalism among members of Congress.
On November 14, for example the current US House Chaplain, Margaret Grun Kibben stood before members of Congress and lectured the US Representatives there through the following prayer:
“Holy and eternal god, praise be to your name forever and ever. All wisdom and power are yours. When measured against your authority and dominion over the whole of creation, any advantage we boast, any victory we claim, fall short. Humble us that we would acknowledge that all we have is yours and any influence we wield is held accountable to your design. Immutable lord, you change times and seasons, depose rulers, and raise up those who would replace them. Shape our sense of success into an awareness of and a commitment to our responsibility to live into your grace plan.”
– Margaret Grun Kibben
This is no simple, generic Christian prayer. This official congressional prayer delivered by US government Chaplain Margaret Grun Kibben specifically calls upon members of the United States Congress to be manipulated into accepting the ideology of Christian Nationalism.
Christian Nationalism is the belief that the government of the United States should be under the control of Christian preachers and organizations.
In this prayer, Margaret Grun Kibben declared that the Christian god has “authority and dominion” without limit, even having power over the United States federal government. Kibben then stated that members of Congress should be humbled until they they have become the mere possessions of the Christian god, tools to be used for the purposes of Christianity.
Then, Margaret Grun Kibben made a thinly veiled threat to members of Congress telling them that they have been appointed by the Christian god, and are not accountable to anybody else. Christianity is the power that determines which politicians get to hold public office, Chaplain Kibben said, and Christianity can depose government officials at will.
Through her prayer, government Chaplain Margaret Grun Kibben told the elected members of the US House of Representatives that they must serve the plan of the Christian god, rather than the needs of the American people who elected them.
It’s bad enough that Christian rituals of worship like this are forced on members of the US House of Representatives every day. The fact that the content of the rituals conducted by the House Chaplain is propaganda pressuring members of Congress to adopt Dominionist Christian Nationalism is an insult to the First Amendment and the Cconstitution’s ban on religious tests for public office.
The position of Chaplain of the United States House of Representatives has long been a source of dangerous radicalization in American politics. It’s completely inappropriate for the American people to pay the salary of a Christian preacher who seems bent upon encouraging Christian Nationalist attacks against American democracy.