{"id":357,"date":"2011-02-03T11:03:00","date_gmt":"2011-02-03T11:03:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beliefbeat\/2011\/02\/happy-year-of-the-rabbit-presidential-prayers-for-hemlines.html"},"modified":"2011-02-03T11:03:00","modified_gmt":"2011-02-03T11:03:00","slug":"happy-year-of-the-rabbit-presidential-prayers-for-hemlines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beliefbeat\/2011\/02\/happy-year-of-the-rabbit-presidential-prayers-for-hemlines.html","title":{"rendered":"Happy Year of the Rabbit & Presidential Prayers for Daughter’s Hemlines"},"content":{"rendered":"

For such a short month, February sure does have a lot of holidays!<\/p>\n

Today is Chinese\/Lunar New Year — it’s now the Year of the Rabbit, so my sister-in-law in Hong Kong and her pet bunny are in luck! — and Setsubun-sai, a Shinto celebration. Catholic News Agency has an interesting story <\/a>about how the Gulf Coast’s Vietnamese Catholics celebrated the new year, which the Vietnamese call Tet.<\/p>\n

As for this morning’s National Prayer Breakfast, President Obama, as CNN predicted<\/a>, spoke candidly about his faith <\/a>— still not Islam, folks<\/a>! Check out the last graf of the Associated Press story <\/a>— I’m sure that’s a bipartisan prayer:<\/p>\n

\n

President Barack Obama says he prays regularly and that he and his wife, Michelle, aren’t bothered when they “hear our faith questioned from time to time.” <\/p>\n

Addressing the National Prayer Breakfast Thursday, Obama said that “Christian tradition teaches that the world one day will be turned right side up.” <\/p>\n

But he said that until that happens, the poor and the struggling remain in his prayers. He said he had prayed for God’s intervention on any number or occasions, not always on the weightiest issues of the day. <\/p>\n

At one point, the president said he has prayed, “Lord, give me patience as I watch Malia go to her first dance, where there will be boys. Lord, let her skirt get longer as she travels to that place.” Twelve-year-old Malia is the older of his two daughters. Sasha is 9.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What do you think? Share your thoughts in the Comments section below.<\/p>\n

*Click here to <\/span>subscribe to Belief Beat <\/span><\/strong><\/a>and <\/span>click here to <\/span>follow Belief Beat on Twitter.<\/strong><\/a> <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For such a short month, February sure does have a lot of holidays! Today is Chinese\/Lunar New Year — it’s now the Year of the Rabbit, so my sister-in-law in Hong Kong and her pet bunny are in luck! — and Setsubun-sai, a Shinto celebration. Catholic News Agency has an interesting story about how the Gulf Coast’s Vietnamese…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nHappy Year of the Rabbit & Presidential Prayers for Daughter's Hemlines - Belief Beat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beliefbeat\/2011\/02\/happy-year-of-the-rabbit-presidential-prayers-for-hemlines.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Happy Year of the Rabbit & Presidential Prayers for Daughter's Hemlines - Belief Beat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For such a short month, February sure does have a lot of holidays! Today is Chinese\/Lunar New Year — it’s now the Year of the Rabbit, so my sister-in-law in Hong Kong and her pet bunny are in luck! — and Setsubun-sai, a Shinto celebration. 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