Council Considers Adding Prayer at End of Meetings

October 11, 2006

Author: MICHAEL LAFLEUR

Source: Lowell Sun

https://www.lowellsun.com/2006/10/11/council-considers-adding-prayer-at-end-of-meetings/

Though unwilling to end their practice of opening meetings with a Christian prayer, some city councilors last night offered a potential compromise on the long-held tradition.

Councilor Jim Milinazzo, chairman of the council's rules subcommittee, told members of the Greater Lowell Interfaith Leadership Alliance, or GLILA, that he would consider recommending that his colleagues on the council close their regular meetings with an agreed-upon prayer from the Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic or Jewish faiths.

They would continue saying the "Lord's Prayer," one of the most sacred supplications in Christianity, at the outset of each meeting.

Councilor Rita Mercier agreed with Milinazzo during last night's rules subcommittee meeting, which preceded a full council meeting that, as usual, was opened with a recital of the "Lord's Prayer," also known as the "Our Father."

"I'm OK with somebody having their prayer beside ours, as long as you don't have me try to obliterate what was a tradition long before I got here," she said.