Prayer Or No Prayer. Elected leaders on the Lake Worth City Commission have another option: A moment of silence.

Next Tuesday at City Hall will be a City Commission meeting. Following the roll call at 6:00 Mayor Pam Triolo will begin the meeting with a prayer or a moment of silence. Each of the electeds, in order, has this choice.

For those of you who attend Commission meetings this is all mundane now. But four years ago this City of Lake Worth became national news.

For those of you who were around in December 2014 you well recall what happened that Christmas Season when a particularly insulting atheist came to town. Each year some portend this particular atheist will come back for an encore at City Hall. But he never did.

You see, this particular atheist didn’t like that this City began Commission meetings with a prayer.

This atheist could have accomplished a lot. He could have educated the public about atheism and gone about changing the way our City Commission meetings began. But he chose another approach. He chose to insult everyone of faith. 

But for many new and recently-new residents of this City they have no idea what happened almost four years ago. It took many public meetings, a lot of public debate, and City Attorney Glen Torcivia was kept very busy and so was City Manager Michael Bornstein too, but in the end the process was tweaked and our elected leaders were given another option instead of a prayer in early 2015.

It was a grueling process. But it didn’t have to be.

How and why did this happen?

That is explained in detail later in this blog post.

And more about that insulting atheist too.

And also explained, why do some City Commission meetings begin with a prayer or moment of silence and others don’t?

For example, tomorrow (Dec. 4th, 6:00) at the City Commission will be an invocation or a moment of silence given by Vice Mayor Pro Tem Scott Maxwell.

Generally an invocation is a:

“[F]orm of prayer invoking God’s presence, especially one said at the beginning of a religious service or public ceremony.”

A “moment of silence” is just that. A moment of silence.

Then following the choice by Maxwell at tomorrow’s public meeting next up will be District 2 City Commissioner Omari Hardy who will recite the “Pledge of Allegiance”. The rotation for each of the electeds will change in order each regularly scheduled Commission meeting and each one of the electeds will have their opportunity to recite a prayer or a moment of silence and the requisite Pledge of Allegiance as well.

For many decades though in this City — for as long as anyone can remember prior to 2015 — each and every regularly scheduled meeting of the City Commission began with a prayer. A local pastor or priest of one religious denomination or another would come before the electeds, say a few words and then either stay for a while or leave.

But then in early 2015 everything changed.

And a lot of people got upset. One could say it was quite the kerfuffle. A YouTube video went viral. Not as quite as viral as the “Zombie Alert” but still hundreds of thousands of views.

And it was all mostly orchestrated
from the very beginning.

Sort of like why this City had to stop the Live Streaming of public meetings in early June of this year.

Without further ado. . .

How did this come to be?

Briefly, if the topic of prayer — or topic of no prayer at public meetings — is of special interest to you after reading the blog post below please scroll back up and click on this link for: “Prayer at Local Government Meetings: An Evolving Jurisprudence”.


Whilst on the topic of public meetings. . .


So following the roll call at all regular Commission meetings there is either a prayer or a moment of silence. However at all City Commission workshops, Commission work sessions and meetings of volunteer advisory boards, following the “Roll Call” the meeting proceeds directly to the Pledge of Allegiance.

No prayer. No moment of silence.

A good example is what happened last month. There was a short prayer by Mayor Pam Triolo at the regularly scheduled City Commission meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 16th. However, on the following Thursday there was no prayer or a moment of silence. Why? October 16th was a regular Commission meeting. Thursday was a Work Session.

Explained. What happened in 2015.

The process now is each one of the electeds — the mayor and commissioners in order — has a choice of options. An elected can give a prayer or choose someone from the community. For example, someone from the Jewish or Guatemalan community or even a Wiccan if they want.

How we got here.

It all started in December of 2014 because of one atheist and his very brief visit to our City:


The Insulting Atheist Preston Smith (see below) took advantage of the City process for giving invocations and hijacked the stage. He was given his few minutes to speak and his ‘invocation’ was quite insulting to many, especially for those in attendance that day, including myself. Except for a few people it was a lost opportunity.

Mr. Smith had the option of educating the public about atheism that day and explaining what it is and what it is not. But he chose another option and a lot of you here at the time remember that.

It’s interesting to note that since Mr. Smith’s insulting show not a single Atheist from Lake Worth has stepped up to the plate to represent their beliefs, or lack thereof. Why would that be? Possibly some day an Atheist here in the City will take the opportunity to change that image of atheism some still have after Mr. Smith packed up and left town after insulting all of us.

Mr. Smith came to town for an hour or so. Then he left. But things have changed since then and we’re a better City for it.

“He’s coming back for the New Year”, hailed
The Obtuse Blogger (TOB) during our Christmas
holiday season in 2015.

Some were quite thrilled the Insulting Atheist would return to Lake Worth for an encore. He never has. Would it be the shock/surprise factor has worn off?

Following Mr. Smith’s insulting show the City had meetings, discussion, and ultimately took another route and tweaked the process for giving invocations, or not giving one.

You see, a problem was created for the little City of Lake Worth by Mr. Smith, the Insulting Atheist, and the City began the process of fixing it as best they can. The ‘fix’ is not perfect and not everyone is happy about it. There were and maybe still are a few malcontents in the religious community who are still quite upset about the prospect watching a moment of silence instead of a prayer. But ever since December 2014 they’ve gone completely silent on the issue.


And so it goes. . .