Though City Council meetings are known as the scene of unholy maneuvers and alliances, each begins with a prayer from a local minister. Usually the ministers give thanks and, in a true test of the power of prayer, ask God to guide the aldermen.
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Reverend Donald H. Wheat of the west side’s Third Unitarian Church of Chicago began last week’s invocation by giving thanks for a magnificent city, lulling council members into their customary bowed-head-and-serious-expression poses. Mayor Daley and a few aldermen were listening closely enough to begin looking puzzled when Wheat continued, “Irene Cooney, my neighbor on Race Street, used to pray to thee each morning that thou would choose Chicago for the Second Coming of thy Son!”
After Alderman Virginia Rugai finished introducing the third-grade class from Esmond School and the Morgan Park High School girls’ track and field team, who were all sitting in the council gallery, Alderman Robert Shaw started talking about the council chamber’s men’s washroom.
“Maybe Chicago’s not ready for reform,” Dixon remarked drily.
