Mayor hosts Prayer Breakfast for National Day of Prayer

May 8—Approximately 200 people from all backgrounds gathered Thursday morning to celebrate National Day of Prayer.

London Mayor Randall Weddle hosted the event at the London Community Center last Thursday, which included prayer and a full course breakfast.

The breakfast, catered by Local Honey, was served by city employees including City Hall staff, London Police and London Fire Department members. Weddle said those people had volunteered their services for the event.

Weddle opened the gathering by re-iterating the threats of a lawsuit by the Freedom from Religion group. After Weddle posted the event on the City of London's Facebook page, he received a letter from the group, asking him to withdraw sponsorship of the prayer breakfast.

That prompted Weddle to make a Facebook video post, stating that he would not cancel the event. Instead, he encouraged citizens to come out and participate in the prayer breakfast.

"They told me they would file a lawsuit," Weddle said on Thursday before the crowd. "I'm not worried about a lawsuit. Let's show these bullies that we are not afraid of them and that we can gather together and pray. If that's what the citizens want, then that's what we're going to do."

Weddle provided media with an emailed letter from a second party — signed only by S. Arch using a gmail account — that objected to his sponsorship of a prayer breakfast.

"The Bible is obviously and demonstrably not true history," that letter states. "It is a patchwork of ancient myths, legends and folklore that cannot be taken literally by any sensible person. Even young children can spot the Bible's ridiculous inaccuracies, self-contradictions and falsehoods.....Again, anyone who reads the Bible with an open mind can see that it's both absurd and inherently immoral. Even if interpreted metaphorically, the Bible still fails as a foundation for morality on account of its command to love, worship and obey a fictional character...."

It ends with the following post-script:

"Your 'God' is allegedly omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, all-loving and eternal. Yet, his ego is so fragile that he will torture me forever if I don't believe in him. How absurd!"

Those present for the event, however, sang a different tune than the ones sent by parties opposing the gathering of people for a few moments of prayer. Those who came out said they wanted to express their faith through prayer and to pray for our country, its leaders and all its citizens.