prayer

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has hosted a nine-hour prayer event on the National Mall in Washington, DC, as part of its efforts to commemorate the country’s 250th anniversary.

Sunday’s event was called “Rededicate 250: A National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise and Thanksgiving”, and it took place from 9am to 6pm Eastern US time (13:00 to 22:00 GMT).

On the jubilee’s website, organisers explained that their aim was to mark “rededication of our country as One Nation to God”.

The event featured performers, pastors and civil rights leaders, as well as Trump’s Republican allies, among them Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina.

“Our rights don’t come from the government,” Scott told the crowd. “No, our rights come from God, the king of kings.”

Members of the Trump administration, including the president himself, also recorded video messages that were broadcast from the stage.

Trump’s video showed him seated behind the Resolute Desk in the White House, reciting a speech from the Book of Chronicles that God gave to King Solomon, promising protection to his followers and destruction to those who forsake him.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, meanwhile, used his video to describe the US as a country uniquely shaped by the “Christian idea”.

“Before the Christian West, most societies – and civilisations, for that matter – thought in stagnant cycles: the flooding of the Nile, the return of the rains, the cycle of the harvest. History for them was a wheel to nowhere,” Rubio said.

“But our faith calls us outwards into the limitless darkness of the unknown. It tells us to go forth and preach the gospel to the world as a witness unto all nations and to the ends of the earth.”

The event was not without controversy, though. Critics pointed out that only one speaker, a rabbi, was non-Christian.

Some religious leaders even rejected the event as a political stunt, rather than a sincere testament to faith.

Paul Raushenbush, a reverend and president of the Interfaith Alliance, posted on social media that his objections did not stem from an “antipathy towards religion”. Rather, he said his faith compels him to cherish the “rich tapestry of beliefs” that come together in the US.

“Rededicate 250 is a betrayal of America’s founding values guaranteed in the First Amendment – which made clear that there shall be no establishment of religion by the government and that each one of us should be free to live out our beliefs in our own way,” Raushenbush wrote.

Traditionally, the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution has been interpreted as prohibiting the government from establishing or imposing religious beliefs on its citizens.

But critics argue the Trump administration has blurred the separation between church and state, including by having regular prayer services at the Department of Defense.

Trump, however, has accused the federal government of “anti-Christian bias“. He launched a task force last year to root out the purported discrimination.

Evangelical Christians form a pillar in Trump’s right-wing base of support. The demographic is a powerful force during election seasons in the US, and Trump has sought to rally Christian voters ahead of major votes.

Their views could reshape how the US Constitution is interpreted. A survey from the Pew Research Center released last week found a slight uptick in the number of US adults who believe Christianity should be named as the country’s official religion. Seventeen percent now share that view, up from 13 percent in 2024.

That said, Pew researchers noted that a majority of Americans, roughly 54 percent, still believe in the separation of church and state.

About 52 percent also said that “conservative Christians have gone too far in trying to push their religious values in the government and public schools”.

WASHINGTON — Thousands of people streamed onto the National Mall for a daylong prayer rally Sunday headlined by President Trump and billed as a “rededication of our country as One Nation under God.”

Against the backdrop of the Washington Monument, worship music blared from a stage that made clear the event’s Christian focus. Arched stained-glass windows, set underneath grand columns resembling a federal building, depicted the nation’s founders alongside a white cross.

The nation’s tradition of separating church and state, however, was not on display. Most speakers celebrated Christianity’s ties to American history, a blending of ideas that critics decried before the gathering as Christian nationalism.

Trump read a passage of Scripture in a video shown at the rally. Filmed in the Oval Office, it was the same footage used during a marathon Bible-reading event last month. The verses from 2 Chronicles are often cited by those who claim America was founded as a Christian nation.

“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways,” Trump read, “then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”

Other leading Republicans, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), were also on the schedule for the event, part of the celebrations marking the nation’s 250th anniversary.

Only one name on the Rededicate 250 program was not Christian. Most were among Trump’s longtime evangelical supporters, including Paula White-Cain of the White House Faith Office and evangelist Franklin Graham of Samaritan’s Purse.

“We are deeply concerned that what is really being rededicated is a nation to a very narrow and ideological part of the Christian faith that betrays our nation’s fundamental commitment to religious freedom,” said the Rev. Adam Russell Taylor, a Baptist minister who leads the progressive Christian organization Sojourners.

The conservative Christian lineup featured guests who often assert that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, a narrative disputed by many historians and other religious traditions and inconsistent with American legal precedent.

Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, noted the religious diversity of early America, including Jews, Muslims and Indigenous people. “I want to shine a light on America’s history as a nation that welcomes, celebrates and protects people of all faiths and those of no faith,” Pesner said.

‘It’s all about Jesus’

Many in the crowd wore Trump hats and patriotic colors, joining the festivities under a sweltering sun.

“It’s all about Jesus,” said Denny Smith, 72, of Rhode Island, who rented a motorized scooter to traverse the National Mall.

Retha Bond, a 58-year-old from southern Illinois, said she was here to hear Trump speak nearby on Jan. 6, 2021. She said she did not join the protesters who rioted later that day at the Capitol, attacking police officers while attempting to overturn the presidential election result, but she has remained a steadfast Trump supporter.

“I’m not saying Trump is the savior,” Bond said. But she said that “this is one of the most important things that could be going on in the world, for us to rededicate our nation back to God.”

At least one event speaker mentioned the slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Kirk’s activism has been a powerful example for Alessandra Seawright, 15, of Santa Fe, N.M., who came to Rededicate 250 with her mother.

“I think we just need more of this in our country, and we just need to share the word of the Lord,” she said. “We love going to events like this.”

They also attended Kirk’s memorial service in Arizona, which mixed Christian worship and political messages. Events like these, Seawright said, help her feel less alone in her conservative Christian beliefs.

Prayer event spurs protest

Hegseth, who has infused Christian language and worship with his role leading the Pentagon — drawing criticism — asked the gathering in a video to pray to “our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Referencing George Washington’s faith, he said, “Let us pray without ceasing. Let us pray for our nation on bended knee.”

Orthodox Jewish Rabbi Meir Soloveichik was the only non-Christian religious leader listed on the program. To applause, he told the crowd, “Antisemitism is utterly un-American” — a seeming reference to debates dividing the right.

Soloveichik serves on the Trump administration’s Religious Liberty Commission along with White-Cain, Graham and Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Bishop Robert Barron, Catholic clerics also featured on the program.

The event was organized by Freedom 250, a public-private partnership backed by the White House. Congressional Democrats have questioned the nonprofit’s structure and finances, which they see as a Trump-controlled end run around a separate commission charted by Congress a decade ago to prepare semiquincentennial events.

Progressive groups staged counter-programming. Among them were the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which advocates a strict separation of church and state, and the Christian organization Faithful America. The two groups displayed a large balloon near the mall of a Trump-like golden calf, a biblical reference to idolatry.

On Thursday evening, the Interfaith Alliance projected protest slogans onto an exterior wall of the National Gallery of Art. “Democracy not theocracy,” said one. Another said: “The separation of church and state is good for both.”

Stanley writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Peter Smith in Pittsburgh contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, leading a Pentagon prayer meeting, quoted a fictional bible verse taken from a violent monologue in Quentin Tarantino’s 1994 film “Pulp Fiction,” originally delivered by actor Samuel L. Jackson just before his character shoots a helpless man to death.

The secretary used the prayer to frame the war in Iran as an act of divine justice, the same justification Jackson’s character cites in the film before pulling the trigger.

Hegseth told the audience at a monthly Pentagon worship service held Wednesday that he learned the prayer from the lead mission planner of a team called “Sandy 1,” which recently rescued downed Air Force crew members in Iran.

Hegseth said the verse is frequently spoken by combat search-and-rescue crews, who call the prayer “CSAR 25:17, which I think is meant to reflect Ezekiel 25:17” from the Bible.

“And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to capture and destroy my brother,” Hegseth recited. “And you will know my call sign is Sandy 1, when I lay my vengeance upon thee.”

The infamous Ezekiel 25:17 speech from “Pulp Fiction” is almost entirely a screenwriter’s creation; only the final refrain is loosely inspired by the actual biblical verse. The majority of the monologue in Tarantino’s film is adapted from the opening of the 1976 Japanese martial arts film “The Bodyguard,” with action star Sonny Chiba.

Hegseth’s minute-long prayer closely followed those scripts, with only the last two lines resembling language from the Bible. In Hegseth’s version, he replaced “and they shall know that I am the Lord,” from the book of Ezekiel with the call sign for a U.S. A-10 Warthog aircraft.

Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell said some outlets accused Hegseth of mistaking Jackson’s Golden Globe-winning performance with actual scripture, and called that narrative “fake news.”

“Secretary Hegseth on Wednesday shared a custom prayer, referenced as the CSAR prayer, used by the brave warfighters of Sandy-1 who led the daylight rescue mission of Dude 44 Alpha out of Iran, which was obviously inspired by dialogue in Pulp Fiction,” Parnell wrote on X. “However, both the CSAR prayer and the dialogue in Pulp Fiction were reflections of the verse Ezekiel 25:17, as Secretary Hegseth clearly said in his remarks at the prayer service. Anyone saying the Secretary misquoted Ezekiel 25:17 is peddling fake news and ignorant of reality.”

Hegseth has frequently used his prayer sessions to call for violence in the ongoing Iran war. In last month’s sermon, he asked God to “grant this task force clear and righteous targets for violence.”

The services are not mandatory, a senior defense analyst with knowledge of Pentagon operations told The Times, but some who work closely with Hegseth’s office feel an “implied pressure” to attend and “fill seats.”

The effect — some feel — is less attention on the Pentagon’s wartime efforts, and more on supporting political stunts, according to the source, who is not authorized to speak to the media and requested anonymity.

“We have managers and leaders that are missing mission critical work to go listen to ‘Pulp Fiction’ quotes,” the source said. “It delays our ability to make operational, mission related war-fighting decisions.”

The prayer came amid an ongoing clash between the Trump administration and Pope Leo XIV, who has spoken out in recent weeks against the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran. Statements from the Vatican were met with a series of reprisals from President Trump, who said he doesn’t “want a pope” who criticizes the president of the United States.

On Thursday, the pope released a statement against military leaders who conflate war with divinity.

“Woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic, and political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth,” he said.