Friday, November 03, 2006
No worries, we'll pray for rain
Premier Beattie’s latest strategy for beating the drought is [Christian] prayer.

That ought to do it.

Beattie wants to “galvanise the powers of prayer at this critical time”. Church leaders have responded enthusiastically to his call and will run a series of church services focusing on imploring the gods for some of the wet stuff.

Other religious communities have all been invited to join in too, just in case the Christian god is not responsible for orchestrating meteorological patterns.

I am getting slightly worried. Not so much by the lack of rain, but by the fact a modern, supposedly secular, government has to resort to prayer, rather than policy, to deliver water.

Of course, Beattie’s appeal to the Christian faith to solve the water crisis has nothing whatsoever to do with the criticism he recently copped for spending public funds on supporting the Muslim Ede Festival this weekend week, much to the chagrin of voters not far removed from One Nation Party.

But frankly, if I had even the vaguest flicker of Christian faith in me, I would be offended at such squalid political manipulation of my religion. Even with my limited understanding of Christian theology, I have learned that you don’t just “ask and [H]e shall give.” Otherwise half of all Christians would be lottery winners with big boobs.

But maybe I am behind the times and god has implemented a more customer-centric corporate philosophy, where the delivery of customer needs and the exceeding of their expectations is the paramount goal.

If that’s the case, it looks like my weekend is ruined.

Ironically, scientific weather forecasting, based on observation, modelling and statistics predicts rain this weekend. Now if it transpires, will this be the result of hundreds of years of acquired scientific knowledge, or some devoted, but misguided, churchgoer having a good pray?

And if it’s the latter why did they wait until now? Are they some kind of psycho?

---