[SoCalCoug]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

Anyway, so he is called on to say the prayer. He starts off by saying "we are thankful for the opportunity to audition for the skit, we ask that we might be selected to participate." I swear, he then went onto about 50 other subjects. It was a sincere prayer, but there was no topic not covered in that prayer. It was literally 10 minutes long. I was having trouble not laughing during the prayer (which I desperately stifled, because the bishop of the other ward was there). When he finished, the other scouts all groaned, "that's the longest prayer I've ever heard!" "thanks for the talk" "you blessed the food 3 times". Me and another asst. scoutmaster could not contain ourselves any longer. We were ROTFLMAO.

So after cobbler, the bishop decides he better give a little speech. He went through every phrase of the scout oath, every word in the scout law, asking questions and explaining each facet, in addition to explaining the "on my honor" award. It was about 20 minutes. And very painful.

He is a former scoutmaster, and should remember that such times are called "the scoutmaster minute." MINUTE.

I always wonder when these sort of things stop being a sincere prayer / talk and turn into an ego trip. There are very few people I'm interested in listening to for more than five minutes. You can be sincere in 30 seconds. With the kid, I understand that being nervous in front of a crowd can cause you to ramble a bit, but when things like that happen, they're usually following the example of a blow-hard parent.

I hate long public prayers that are really sermons, and I hate long, pointless speeches. Are people clueless? Can't you see a bunch of teenagers in front of you, getting restless after twenty minutes of sermonizing to them? It doesn't mean they're rude. It means you're boring.