Obama to hold his presidential prayer service at the National Cathedral

By Mary Ann Mueller
VOL Special Correspondent
12/11/2008

Washington, D.C.---The word is out. There is to be a post-inaugural prayer service at the National Cathedral. However, at this time the plans are still not formalized and are very incomplete, other than the fact is it to take place on Wed., Jan. 21, 2009.

The only thing for sure is that the newly inaugurated President Barack Obama and his new Vice President Joe Biden will be present for the prayerful event, one of several inaugural events spread over a four-day period of time celebrating the new administration's stepping up to the helm. The elongated celebration kicks off on Sat., Jan., 17 and includes a wide variety of balls, galas, brunches, luncheons, concerts, the new administration's swearing in ceremonies, the inaugural parade, with one of the final official events being the Presidential Prayer Service at the National Cathedral.

Shin Inouye, a spokesman for the Presidential Inaugural Committee confirmed, that the prayer service would be held at the National Cathedral, but that "the details have not been locked down yet." He is still very busy hammering out the finer points for the Inauguration Day Parade.

The invitation from the Presidential Inaugural Committee came in response to the National Cathedral's offer to again host the Presidential Prayer Service.

"We sent a letter," explained Haley Hilliard Worship Office Coordinator and Assistant to the Canon Precentor. "They (the Presidential Inaugural Committee) chose us over other venues. We just got confirmation last week."

This isn't the first time that the National Cathedral has hosted a presidential prayer service. The Cathedral was the church used by both Presidents Bush. The Washington house of worship has served as a national place of prayer for almost a century.

"The President and Vice President will participate in the prayer service," Inouye confirmed. "There is a past tradition of holding prayer services at the National Cathedral."

According to tradition, at noon on Jan., 20 Barack Obama, a United Christ of Christ member, will be sworn in as the nation's 44th chief executive in the country's 56th inaugural event, with Joe Biden, a Roman Catholic, becoming the America's 47th vice president.

The National Cathedral's website explains that the Cathedral has been a part of Washington, D.C's spiritual fabric from the days of George Washington, who was Episcopalian himself. More than a dozen American presidents have worshipped as members of the Episcopal Church. The first president commissioned prime architect Pierre L'Enfant to design the "Federal City". It was L'Enfant who first envisioned a "great church for national purposes."

However it was more than a century later when the plans for the National Cathedral final got off the ground when Congress granted a charter and incorporation papers to the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral Foundation of the District of Columbia, allowing it to establish a cathedral and institutions of higher learning. President Benjamin Harrison signed the charter, and it is considered the "birth certificate" of Washington National Cathedral. Mount St. Alban was eventually chosen as the site of the Cathedral by Washington's first Episcopal bishop, the Rt. Rev. Henry Yates Satterlee.

Hilliard theorized that one reason the National Cathedral was chosen as the site of the 2009 Presidential Prayer Service was that the Secret Service was very familiar with the worship space and grounds, calling it a safe place to worship.

The Cathedral has been the site of presidents Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford's state funerals. In addition President George W. Bush led the nation in prayer from there following the 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center's Twin Towers.

Other American presidents who worshipped at the National Cathedral include: Woodrow Wilson who attended a Service of Thanksgiving following the end of the Great War (WWI); Warren G. Harding prayed for peace with the delegates of an Armaments Limitation Conference; and Calvin Coolidge opened the 49th Episcopal General Convention in 1928 from the Cathedral.

Other notables who have come to the National Cathedral in prayer have included Queen Elizabeth II and the Rev. Martin Luther King.

Hilliard and Inouye will be working closely together to develop the Presidential Prayer Service which will be next month.

"Plenty of conversations are happening, " Hilliard confided.

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori was enthroned as the Episcopal Church's 26th presiding bishop at the National Cathedral. Her office could not confirm if she would be a part of President Obama's Prayer Service.

---Mary Ann Mueller is a retired journalist living in Texas