A call for national repentance on a day of prayer

Faith leaders gathered in Washington, D.C., today for the National Day of Prayer pointed out the stark contrast between the faith of the nation’s founders and our current leaders.

“It’s startling to me to see the arrogance of America in our generation,” said Jack Graham, pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, and honorary chairman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force, who issued an urgent call for religious revival in the United States, saying, “America desperately needs God.”

Radio host and Focus on the Family founder James Dobson articulated a reason for the passion with which many at the event called on the nation to repent: the cultural acceptance of and the pending Supreme Court decision about same-sex marriage.

“This may be an overstatement, but I don’t think so. I believe this is as important of a decision by the court as Roe v. Wade was in 1973,” Dobson said, adding that the high court’s approval of same-sex marriage would be the “death knell of religious liberty in America.”

Though not all of the speakers at the event emphasized the same-sex marriage debate, many of them echoed the notion that the country’s moral and religious values have weakened since its founding. Ben Carson, who recently announced his candidacy for president, shamed those who removed stories of the faith of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin from history textbooks.

“Part of this difficult period we’re in is because we have refused to stand up,” Carson said.

While the speakers painted a gloomy state of faithfulness in the United States as a whole, most of them offered personal stories of the hope they had found from faith in Jesus Christ. District of Columbia Superior Court Judge Robert Rigsby told how faith gave him hope as he recovered from a rare, paralyzing disorder. U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, told how he prayed at the bedside of his prematurely born daughter. Carson shared how prayer and reading Scripture delivered him from a dangerously bad temper. And Senate Chaplain Barry Black told how his mother’s prayers helped break a generational cycle of poverty and pathology.

“We need as people of faith to make prayer as natural as breathing,” Black said.

Congress and President Harry S Truman instituted the National Day of Prayer in 1952. In addition to the National Day of Prayer Task Force’s observance at the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, groups across the country hosted local events lifting up the nation’s leaders in prayer.

President Barack Obama issued a declaration in support of National Day of Prayer, saying, “In the face of tremendous challenges, prayer is a powerful force for peace, justice, and a brighter, more hopeful tomorrow. … I join all people of faith in asking for God’s continued guidance, mercy, and protection as we seek a more just world.”

WORLD Digital’s Whitney Williams contributed to this report.