Unexpectedly, the naked appeal to emotion fails to move Ramesh. Couldn’t have seen that one coming.
In all seriousness, though, Mr. Chapman should get out more. The very scenario he imagines plays out every day in this country, as town councils and county boards and the like conscientiously broaden their traditional invocations. I probably heard the Adhan a half-dozen times at various meetings in suburban Philadelphia over the course of a couple of years, along with various other kinds of prayers: Hindu, Jewish, the odd Episcopalian.
The city council in my hometown has been known to convene to say prayers for rain; in a particularly nice touch, they’ve also convened to say prayers of thanks after it does rain. To fail to be charmed by that, much less to take offense at it, requires a kind of fanaticism.