"Lord, please DON'T hear this prayer"

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Oct 31, 2004

Ever been nettled by Prayers of the Faithful at Mass that sound like National Public Radio? George Weigel hits a live nerve in explaining why he can't join in petitioning God to let Himself be instructed by Nina Totenberg:

The subscription services that supply many parishes with their general intercessions often turn the petitions into mini-sermons in which various messages, theological and political, are encoded. I particularly dislike the now-widespread custom of jumping immediately from a pro forma prayer for the universal church or the pope to a second, much lengthier petition for some political desideratum, often accompanied by a protracted secondary clause suggesting, not too subtly, that all social goods are to be secured by government action.

Feel free to post below the most egregious specimens gleaned from your own experience of massgoing.