Metroplex Atheists Square Off Against Rowlett's Mayor. The Mayor Says He'll Pray for Them.
This week in godlessness brings us to Rowlett, where Mayor Todd Gottel is feeling pretty good. He'll be running unopposed soon for his second term as mayor and third term on the City Council. The rest of the time, he owns a "sales and marketing" company, per the city of Rowlett's website, is a precinct chair for the Dallas County Republican Party, and runs the sound boards over at First Baptist Church of Rowlett, from whence he posts frequent Facebook updates. And he's not about to let a bunch of atheist malcontents take that away from him.
"Interesting visitors at the Rowlett Council Meeting tonight," Gottel wrote on Facebook on March 5. "The Metroplex Athiests [sic] came to protest our Council Invocations before our City Council meetings begin. Please pray for them that they may be open to God's love and His word."
The Metroplex Atheists contend that Gottel seems to have missed the point of their visit.
The Rowlett City Council (like the Dallas City Council) chooses to begin each of its meetings with an invocation -- a prayer, and one that's directed in Jesus' specific direction, rather than some general, fuzzy Supreme Being. The prayer itself isn't illegal: the Supreme Court ruled back in 1983, in Marsh v. Chambers that legislative prayer could be constitutional and not a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, provided " there is no indication that the prayer opportunity has been exploited to proselytize or advance any one, or to disparage any other faith or belief."
More at http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2013/03/metroplex_atheists_square_off.php .
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