Not A Prayer

People who have some kind of religious feelings often believe that they can communicate with their Deity – and some even believe that their prayers can in some way influence human events, or even non-human, such as the weather. As practiced in most cultures today, there seems to be little harm in such beliefs. But it wasn’t so long ago that the practice of sacrifice was quite prevalent. I suppose it was thought that this was a way of giving something of value to the Gods and hoping for some kind of reciprocal benefit.

Eyewitness descriptions of such practices can be very unsettling. Accounts given by early Spanish explorers of what is now Mexico include descriptions of cutting the hearts out of living human victims. But our own biblical record is not so free of cutting and killing for the Lord.

As you may recall, the Bible contains a charming story about a man named Noah, who was spared when God had decided that He was so dissatisfied with the world He had created that He would destroy it with a Great Flood. According to the Biblical account, it rained for forty days and forty nights. But Noah, who was apparently a very good man, had been warned in time. Under divine instructions, he constructed a special vessel, an “Ark,” which was large and sturdy enough to contain all that would be necessary to start the whole world anew.

So, before the deluge began, the Ark took aboard all the seeds of a reborn Society. These included the male and female of every species of animal. As promised, then came enough rain to drown every living thing still on dry land.

The whole story of how the Ark finally came to rest, and Noah deciding it was safe to go ashore, is moving and dramatic – and it all makes a wonderful tale for children. But what those young people are not generally told is that one of the first things Noah did on land was to start killing and sacrificing the very animals he had done so much to save.

In warfare especially, each participating force has, throughout History, prayed for victory, and often had slogans to that effect. Crusaders carried banners saying “God Wills It.” Germans proclaimed “Gott Mit Uns.”

As you may know, the soldiers of ancient Rome carried a banner with the letters: “SPQR.” You may have thought that this was some kind of religious invocation.

Actually, it was quite sectarian, and stood for the Latin words meaning:

“The Senate and The Roman People.”

One of the most notorious characters in English History was Oliver Cromwell, who ruled the country for several years, believing he was an instrument of God. To him, this justified some atrocious behavior, particularly in Ireland, where his army behaved so ruthlessly that, to this day, in that country it is a terrible malediction to wish someone “The Curse of Cromwell on you.”

The British royal coat of arms still contains the expression, in Norman French, meaning “GOD AND MY RIGHT.”

It is also told of Cromwell that, leading his army across a river, he instructed them: “Trust in God – and Keep your Powder Dry.” The powder was of course gunpowder, of which each man carried his own supply to fire the flintlock weapon of that day.

The second part of that expression was still so well-known at the time of World World Two that it was used as the title of a movie about military nurses, starring Lana Turner. But the movie contained no explanation of the origin of the expression and left it to movie-goers to assume that the “powder” being referred to was women’s face-powder.

But a truer story from that War concerns the expression “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition.” Those words were supposed to have been spoken by a Navy chaplain who happened to be on the deck of an American battleship docked at Pearl Harbor on the very day of the Japanese attack – December 7, 1941.

Instead of withdrawing to any safety he could find, this man helped to assist at one of the gun-turrets still firing at the enemy. It was in connection with this situation that the words may have been uttered. In any case, they soon became a popular song. The lyrics refer to him, using military slang for a chaplain:

“The Sky-pilot said it,
and you’ve gotto give him credit, 
For a son-of-a-gun of a gunner was he.”