{"id":37517,"date":"2026-05-29T12:57:31","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T11:57:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=37517"},"modified":"2026-06-23T13:43:56","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T12:43:56","slug":"the-lords-prayer-is-back-in-kent-after-38-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/the-lords-prayer-is-back-in-kent-after-38-years\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lord\u2019s Prayer Is Back in Kent after 38 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kent County Council<\/b><\/a> has voted to introduce the Lord\u2019s Prayer at the beginning of its meetings, and the reaction tells you everything you need to know about the state of public life in Britain. Forty-eight councillors supported opening meetings with prayer, while 46 also backed closing them with the national anthem, which is hardly a riotous revolution. Yet even this modest return to reverence is enough to set off the usual alarms from those who seem happiest when public institutions are spiritually empty.<\/p>\n

Some councillors wanted to replace prayer with a silent moment of reflection in order to reflect the area\u2019s multi-faith culture. But silence is not neutrality when it is used to crowd out Christian worship; it is a more polite form of removal. Council Leader Linden Kemkaran was right to say she wanted the Lord\u2019s Prayer to \u201ctake up the space\u201d of that silence, because Britain does not need another nervous institutional compromise pretending not to know what it is.<\/p>\n

Kent County Council\u2019s decision to begin meetings with the Lord\u2019s Prayer is exactly the sort of development that exposes how nervous modern institutions have become about Christianity in public life. What should be a straightforward acknowledgement of Britain\u2019s heritage is now treated as if it were some bold and unsettling act.<\/p>\n

Psalm 95:6-7 O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker. For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cA ridiculous farce\u201d?<\/h2>\n

Green councillor Rob Yates called the change \u201ca ridiculous farce,\u201d saying he was \u201cnot paid by taxpayers to sing songs and pray.\u201d That complaint sounds very modern: elected officials may preside over endless layers of bureaucracy, but heaven forbid they should pause to acknowledge the God whose moral order underpins the country they govern. Apparently, the public square is meant to be filled with procedure, but not prayer.<\/p>\n

The National Secular Society added its own familiar protest, describing the move as \u201cregressive and divisive,\u201d which is the sort of language routinely deployed whenever Christianity refuses to stay quietly in the background. Reform UK councillor Christopher Hespe, who proposed the prayers, said he found the hostility \u201castonishing\u201d and called the Lord\u2019s Prayer part of heritage and roots. Quite so. A nation that cannot tolerate its own roots will eventually discover that it has become unrecognisable even to itself.<\/p>\n

Prayers have not been said at Kent County Council meetings since 1987, which is revealing in itself. It means generations of public life have drifted further and further from what was once considered normal, and now basic Christian observance is treated as though it requires special justification.<\/p>\n

Matthew 6:9-13 After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.<\/b><\/p>\n

Other Councils<\/h2>\n

Derbyshire County Council<\/b><\/a> also introduced prayers at the start of meetings last year after coming under Reform UK control, which suggests that some councils still understand the difference between heritage and hostility to heritage. Public prayer in local government is not some exotic import; it is a reminder that civic authority is not self-made and should not behave as if it is.<\/p>\n

By contrast, other councils have gone in the opposite direction. St Albans City and District Council voted to end prayers<\/b><\/a> because they might \u201cexclude or alienate individuals of different faiths or those without religious beliefs.\u201d That argument has become the standard escape hatch of institutions that are afraid to defend anything at all. It sounds tolerant, but in practice it often means Christian tradition must keep retreating until the only thing left is blandness.<\/p>\n

The deeper issue is not whether every person in the room shares the same belief, but whether public life still has the confidence to acknowledge the tradition that shaped it. If the answer is no, then the real exclusion is not caused by prayer but by the culture that cannot bear to hear it.<\/p>\n

Proverbs 22:28 Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set.<\/b><\/p>\n