VIDEO: Public university prayer pushes for minimum wage increase, fix 'immoral' immigration system

A Maryland State Delegate opened the 2014 spring semester at Bowie State University with an invocation prayer chastising a racist justice system, an immoral immigration system, and a call for an increased minimum wage, all in the name of Jesus Christ.

In a video of the event obtained by Campus ReformMaryland State Delegate James Proctor (D-27A) inserts strikingly liberal political rhetoric into the opening prayer during Wednesday morning’s event, which students were required to attend.

“We have work to do, to remediate the justice system that imposes harsh and unfair, unjust sentences primarily on our black and brown brothers and sisters for minor drug related offenses," Proctor said. "We have work to do to fix the immoral immigration system. We have work to do to complete the progress whereby every citizen has access to quality and affordable healthcare. We have work to do to ensure that minimum wage of [sic] employees have the dignity of a living wage and a stepping stone into a currently shrinking middle class.

Watch: Maryland State Delegate inserts politics into convocation prayer

"So Heavenly Father, please give us strength and focus to carry on the fight and not lose sight of the goal that the hope expressed in the anthem ‘We Shall Overcome’ becomes complete and total reality, all this we pray in Jesus name, Amen.”

Bowie State senior Eugene Craig filmed the event to demonstrate how “Bowie State University continues to be full of hypocrites on the issue of intellectual diversity.”

“I could not tell if I was at a campus progress rally or the official opening of the university,” Craig told Campus Reform, “but as this event is mandatory to attend for many students, it should be an apolitical one.”

A campus wide email mandated students attend the event and the public university, the oldest historically black university in Maryland, cancelled all morning classes.

Craig told Campus Reform he was disappointed the prayer was used to advance a liberal ideology.

“Prayer is supposed to be uniting, but this turned into something divisive,” Craig said, “There is no limit to the left seeking political gain - they are using anything possible to advance a political agenda.”

Neither Bowie State University nor the office of Delegate Proctor (D-27A) responded for requests for comment from Campus Reform in time for publication.

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