Speaking of prayer, we seem to have reached a point in this country where prayer is not only neglected by believers, it is ridiculed by unbelievers.

BreakPoint reported a few days ago that Vice President Mike Pence was roundly castigated for daring to pray before a meeting to discuss appropriate action on the coronavirus Here’s a sample of what was said according to BreakPoint:

• One secular research website headlined the photo with this take: “Symbolic of the moral and intellectual decay at the White House, a photo shows Vice President Mike Pence and his team trying to pray away the coronavirus.” Pence and his team were “wallowing in ignorant superstition and willful ignorance,” the site continued, suggesting that Pence prays because he’s a “religious extremist.”
• Another slant, this one from an out-and-proud atheist: “It’s not a joke when people say these Republicans are trying to stop a virus with prayer. What else did anyone expect? Science? Reason? Something sensible?”
• One of the most viral tweets of the photo had this caption: “Mike Pence and his coronavirus emergency team praying for a solution. We are so [blanked].”

We seem to be on a regression:

When the founding fathers were working on the constitution, Benjamin Franklin famously called the participants to prayer with this statement: 

I have lived, Sir, a long time; and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it possible that an empire can rise without his aid?

In short, prayer was accepted and expected.

The late Howard Hendricks, a well-known professor from Dallas Theological Seminary, used to tell this story:

There was a drought in Texas that, after it had continued for a time, officials called for a day of prayer. A woman responded, “Prayer? My God, has it come to that?”

She saw prayer as a last resort.

And now today, if people are convinced there is no God, prayer is seen to be at best, an exercise in futility; at worst, a sign of derangement.

Praying is an example of “moral and intellectual decay.”

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! (Isaiah 5.20, 21, ESV)