As a member of the O’Fallon Board of Aldermen in 1994, I attended the National League of Cities Convention. In one of the meetings, the speaker asked for a show of hands if we start our meetings in our own cities with an invocation. I couldn’t raise my hand because we didn’t in O’Fallon. The speaker went on to inform us that this is a good practice and perfectly legal.

I came home, walked into the office of my City Administrator and expressed my desire to have an invocation at the beginning of our board meetings. He laughed and told me he didn’t know whom we would get to do it.

I went to the next police chaplains’ meeting and told them my city administrator said none of them would be interested in spending time it would take to come up to our City Hall and pray before our meetings and I needed them to help me prove him wrong. They loved the idea and stepped up to the task.