Obama breaks from Bush on prayer day

President Obama's latest break from his predecessor is drawing some ire among some Christian groups.

While former President Bush held formal events in the White House each year to mark the National Day of Prayer, Obama is opting today for a private observance and issuing an official proclamation.

UPDATE: In the proclamation, Obama takes a decidedly ecumenical tack. He does not mention the nation's Judeo-Christian heritage.

Instead, the president emphasizes compassion, thanks the service of members of the military, and cites the "one law that binds all great religions together: the Golden Rule and its call to love one another, to understand one another, and to treat with dignity and respect those with whom we share a brief moment on this Earth."

"Our world grows smaller by the day, and our varied beliefs can bring us together to feed the hungry and comfort the afflicted; to make peace where there is strife; and to lift up those who have fallen on hard times," the proclamation says.

Praising the armed forces, he says "it is because of them that we continue to live in a nation where people of all faiths can worship or not worship according to the dictates of their conscience."

"I call upon Americans to pray in thanksgiving for our freedoms and blessings and to ask for God's continued guidance, grace, and protection for this land that we love."

(Click here to read the proclamation.)

"We are disappointed in the lack of participation by the Obama administration," Shirley Dobson, chairwoman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force, said in a statement. "At this time in our country's history, we would hope our president would recognize more fully the importance of prayer."

The theme for the 58th annual observance is "Prayer... America's Hope" and is based on Psalm 33:22: "May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you."

But other religious groups praised Obama for dialing back the observance, and accused the task force of trying to exclude non-Christians. Dobson is the spouse of James Dobson of Focus on the Family, a politically active Christian conservative group.

"It is a shame that the National Day of Prayer Task Force seems to think it owns the National Day of Prayer," the Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, president of the Interfaith Alliance, said in a statement. The alliance sent a letter to Obama urging him to make this year's observance more inclusive of other faiths.

"Once again, the Task Force is misrepresenting the purpose of this national observance," Gaddy added. "President Obama is not the pastor-in-chief of the nation and Shirley Dobson's Task Force is not the spiritual judge of the president's personal or official actions."