Foreword

Whereas the Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde, the bishop leading the inaugural prayer service, used her position inappropriately, promoting political bias instead of advocating the full counsel of biblical teaching: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That— (1) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that the sermon given at the National Prayer Service on January 21st, 2025, at the National Cathedral was a display of political activism; and (2) the House of Representatives condemns the Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde’s distorted message. So reads the closing lines of U.S. House Resolution 59, proposed by Rep. John Brecheen (a Republican elected in 2023 and who represents Oklahoma’s 2nd Congressional District) and co-sponsored by twenty-two of his Republican colleagues; on January 23, 2025, the resolution—which, of course, is far different from a bill that might become a law if passed by both the House and the Senate and then signed by the President—was referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Government, which will eventually determine if it is to be put forward to the full House of Representatives for a vote. (If so, and if it passes, then it retains merely symbolic effect, of course.)