{"id":26174,"date":"2025-01-24T11:05:48","date_gmt":"2025-01-24T16:05:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=26174"},"modified":"2025-01-24T11:05:48","modified_gmt":"2025-01-24T16:05:48","slug":"city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","title":{"rendered":"City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at Meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_26168\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-26168\" style=\"width: 1200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/01\/tulsa-pagan-prayer_credit-Adobe-Stock_KTUL-Youtube.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26168\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/01\/tulsa-pagan-prayer_credit-Adobe-Stock_KTUL-Youtube.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"900\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-26168\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">KTUL \/ Youtube | Adobe Stock<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>A Tulsa City Council has voted to replace opening invocations with a \u201cmoment of silent prayer or personal reflection.\u201d The decision comes after a pagan priestess offered up a prayer to Medusa at the opening of a meeting this past November. The priestess, a woman by the name Amy McAdams, offered up the prayer at the request of then-outgoing council member Crista Patrick. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.publicradiotulsa.org\/local-regional\/2024-11-25\/councilor-responds-to-accusations-of-satanism-in-meeting-prayer\">During her invocation<\/a>, she called on \u201cthe Gorgonea, champions of equality and sacred rage,\u201d and referred to Medusa as the \u201cmonstrous hero of the oppressed and abused.\u201d The prayer was quickly labeled satanic, with Oklahoma governor Kevin Stitt blasting it on social media. \u201cSatan is trying to establish a foothold, but Oklahoma is going to be a shining city on the hill,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Due to the controversy, the council voted 8-1 to replace opening invocations with a moment of silent prayer or personal reflection. Councilor Christian Bengel abstained from the vote. Councilor Laura Bellis proposed the rule change. \u201cOf course, we have invocations where anyone can sign up of any faith for, but the one time they may be there, it usually is a Christian prayer, and may send the message that their government is not for them or they don\u2019t belong,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.publicradiotulsa.org\/local-regional\/2025-01-16\/tulsa-council-removes-invocations-before-meetings-instates-moment-of-silent-prayer-or-reflection\">she said of the proposal<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Bellis acknowledged complaints she had received from her constituents following the incident with McAdams. \u201cThat really gave the impetus to say, \u2018I don\u2019t want anyone to be in one of our government meetings and feel that what\u2019s being shared is alienating to them or unwelcoming or infringing on their sincerely-held beliefs,\u201d she said. The Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF) supported the move in a <a href=\"https:\/\/ffrf.org\/news\/releases\/ffrf-applauds-tulsa-council-replacing-prayer-with-moment-of-silence\/\">statement<\/a>. The group said it was \u201cpleased\u201d to learn the council had voted to \u201cend its divisive practice of starting meetings with prayer.\u201d \u201cThe national state\/church watchdog wrote to the City Council in November\u00a0urging members to end the practice\u00a0of opening meetings with religious invocations in response to pressure from Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Superintendent Ryan Walters. They and other Christian nationalist officials had urged the council to restrict opening invocations to Christians after a pagan prayer was delivered at a board meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The group applauded the council for including diverse faiths and lack of faith. \u201cGovernment meetings should focus on serving the public good, not on promoting religious practices,\u201d said Dan Barker, FFRF co-president. \u201cThis change ensures that the City Council chambers are welcoming to everyone, regardless of their personal beliefs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Tulsa City Council has voted to replace opening invocations with a \u201cmoment of silent prayer or personal reflection.\u201d The decision comes after a pagan priestess offered up a prayer to Medusa at the opening of a meeting this past November. The priestess, a woman by the name Amy McAdams, offered up the prayer at&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":627,"featured_media":26168,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[534,55,516,54,5,573,1361],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-end-of-the-world","category-islam","category-israel","category-muslim","category-politics","category-poverty","category-satanism"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at Meeting<\/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\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at Meeting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A Tulsa City Council has voted to replace opening invocations with a \u201cmoment of silent prayer or personal reflection.\u201d The decision comes after a pagan priestess offered up a prayer to Medusa at the opening of a meeting this past November. The priestess, a woman by the name Amy McAdams, offered up the prayer at&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-01-24T16:05:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/01\/tulsa-pagan-prayer_credit-Adobe-Stock_KTUL-Youtube.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cecilia Buchanan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at Meeting","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at Meeting","og_description":"A Tulsa City Council has voted to replace opening invocations with a \u201cmoment of silent prayer or personal reflection.\u201d The decision comes after a pagan priestess offered up a prayer to Medusa at the opening of a meeting this past November. The priestess, a woman by the name Amy McAdams, offered up the prayer at&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2025-01-24T16:05:48+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":900,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/01\/tulsa-pagan-prayer_credit-Adobe-Stock_KTUL-Youtube.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cecilia Buchanan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/01\/city-council-pulls-opening-invocations-after-pagan-priestess-prays-at-meeting","name":"City Council Pulls Opening Invocations After Pagan Priestess Prays at 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