"In Jesus' name..."

I recently prayed at a public event where I closed my prayer with the words, "In Jesus' name." Later I was informed that this was offensive and inappropriate.

I have thought about that comment with some bewilderment. I was asked to pray. That in itself would have been an affront, I suppose, to an athiest or an agnostic present in the crowd. What kind of prayer with any substance could be formulated to not be offensive to someone?

I relected on the scenario of the prayer of Rick Warren at the President's Inauguration, which had to be augmented by another prayer and more politically liberal "pray-er" because of Warren's alleged evangelicalism. I later had someone question me about the content of Warren's prayer and his reference to a Muslim "deity".

as a minister annd a Hospice chaplain I am called into many situations where people want me to pray; in fact, they expect me to pray. Recently, I gathered outside a home where a young policeman had died. Family and friends of the family where gathered outside the home as theya waited the removal of the body. As the hearse drove off, I invited this very mixed group of people to join me in prayer. There were tears and sobs, but we prayed. And when it was done, I was hugged by a contingent of people from every walk of life and thanked for my prayer.

And I think I closed it by saying, "In Jesus' name..."