A prayer festival calls for more religion in politics, not less
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 17 May 2026
⏱️ 14 minutes
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| 0:00.0 | It's consider this where every day we go deep on one big news story. |
| 0:04.5 | On the National Mall in Washington, D.C. on Sunday, thousands of people gathered as part of a prayer event, partially funded and organized by the Trump administration called Rededicate 250. |
| 0:15.4 | I went down to understand what the organizers were looking to achieve and why many people traveled a long distance to come. |
| 0:22.2 | We're standing here on the lawn pretty close. We can see the Washington Monument. |
| 0:27.0 | There are people streaming in as we speak. People are singing in the background. They've set up picnic blankets. |
| 0:32.3 | And they're all here to rededicate the nation, as they say, to God. |
| 0:36.8 | The scene was striking. |
| 0:38.1 | The stage was set up to look like a mix of a church and a federal building with a really |
| 0:42.4 | large white cross. |
| 0:44.2 | I spoke to Jack Jenkins of Religion News Service about what he noticed. |
| 0:48.2 | The security here is super tight, bigger than I've seen for most events or protests or demonstrations |
| 0:53.6 | on the mall. |
| 0:55.1 | I've been talking to people in the crowd, and it is overwhelmingly evangelical folks who identify |
| 0:59.7 | as evangelical or with non-denominational churches. |
| 1:03.8 | Visually, it's a lot of folks wearing USA gear, which tracks, |
| 1:07.8 | given that this is supposed to be part of a 250th celebration of the United |
| 1:11.3 | States, but also a lot of crosses emblazoned on those shirts. |
| 1:15.5 | I spoke to one group of women who were all wearing one nation under God shirts, and they told me |
| 1:21.0 | that they saw this as rededicating America to God and that that is long overdue. |
| 1:26.6 | So a very particular subset of Christianity seems to be deeply represented here today. |
| 1:31.7 | It was a nine-hour event, and because of that tight security, many people waited hours to get in. |
| 1:37.6 | When President Trump addressed the crowd via video, there were cheers. |
... |
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