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A screaming banner headline on the Drudge Report caught my eye Friday night: “IRS asked group about ‘content of their prayers.'”

What? The IRS was asking people what they talked to God about? That’s what the headline seemed to say, especially given the fact that there were quotes around those last four words. (Here’s a screenshot.) This sounds even further out of bounds than what we already knew about the IRS targeting conservative groups, I thought.

And then I quickly started questioning the source of this allegation. The headline stated it as a fact, not as a mere allegation. Then I followed the story to its source and realized that it was a lie to make a really bad story sound even worse.

According to the Washington Examiner, during the Friday congressional hearing, Rep. Aaron Schock, R-Ill., said this in an exchange with an IRS witness: “Their question, specifically asked from the IRS to the Coalition for Life of Iowa: ‘Please detail the content of the members of your organization’s prayers.'”

So what was the source of this allegation? According to the Examiner, it was a press release issued by the conservative Thomas More Society. The group produced a report — at the request of Schock, the Republican congressman — and the press release contains this charge: “Further questioning by the IRS requested detailed information about the content of the group’s prayer meetings, educational seminars, and signs their members hold outside Planned Parenthood.” [Emphasis mine]

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When I was a teen-ager, I used to write my own stories. It actually started when I was young child, but I didn’t write them down until I was a teen. As I went to sleep each night when I was small, I would lie in bed and make up stories. I was always the hero. As I got a little bit older, the hero would have a different name, but he was really still me.

In one of my stories — when I was about 14 years old — I was one of a group of teen-agers who went to Cape Canaveral and toured a real space shuttle on the launch pad. For some reason, the shuttle was ready for launch and they let a group of teens — about five or six of us — alone to tour the ship. Something terrible happened in the country at exactly that moment and we had to take off in the shuttle. It turned out to be armed with weapons. I was the captain, of course. I brilliantly guided my little band of kids to go blow up some bad guys and save the country.

What I didn’t know at the time is that my immature teen fantasy would one day be roughly the concept behind a reboot of the Star Trek franchise.

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It was the blue of the sky that suddenly grabbed my attention. Then it was the various shades of green in the trees around me. I was taking a walk in my neighborhood Wednesday afternoon when the beauty around me hit me so hard that it almost hurt my heart to feel it all.

For this moment in time, I couldn’t imagine being in any place on earth more beautiful. I couldn’t imagine anything more perfect than the stunning colors and shades and smells of my surroundings. It wasn’t just beauty, though. It was an emotional feeling that welled up inside.

It was about being in the place called home.

I don’t understand nationalism or patriotism anymore. George Bernard Shaw said, “Patriotism is, fundamentally, a conviction that a particular country is the best in the world because you were born in it….” I don’t have any particular argument at the moment with those who feel differently. I’m just saying that I’ve come to a point in life when I don’t feel connected to a country or a government. But I understand what it means to love the land you call home.

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