![\"prayer](\"http:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/alaska-airlines-prayer-card.jpg\" "\\"Alaska")
<\/p>\nGone with the peanuts.<\/p>\n
Not prayer beads.<\/p>\n
Not prayer carpets.<\/p>\n
Not prayer shawls.<\/p>\n
Prayer cards. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
We just came across one here at home several days ago. (And we haven’t flown Alaska in well over a decade.)<\/p>\n
I remember being pleasantly astounded the first time I got one of those on an Alaska flight. Very astounded. Very pleasantly. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n
So this story grabbed me:<\/p>\n
Alaska Airlines will end its 30-plus-year tradition of presenting prayer cards on customers’ meal trays next Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Only first-class passengers have received the cards since 2006, when Alaska stopped providing meals on trays to customers in coach.<\/p>\n
Even now, the cards appear only on flights longer than four hours, when they can be presented on a meal tray as they always have been, said spokeswoman Bobbie Egan.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Hold it. You mean they weren’t stapled to the boarding passes? Or handed out as passengers boarded? Or read aloud by cabin crew reciting all that pre-flight stuff?<\/p>\n
Oh. OK. \ud83d\ude44<\/p>\n
Somehow, the writer found someone that had a serious problem:<\/p>\n
“I’d get a clutch in my stomach when I read it.” \ud83d\ude2f<\/p>\n
So why read it? Or why not request that no such fearsome card be given him?<\/p>\n
And I wonder what automotive parts showed up in his innards when they got to the pre-flight instructions pertaining to using flotation devices. (You’ll need to click the link below for that to make any sense.)<\/p>\n
Oh well.<\/p>\n
Here’s another quote, this one from a company exec:<\/p>\n
“This difficult decision was not made lightly.”<\/p>\n
And since this is a private company, they’re free to decide as they wish. So, Mr. & Mrs. Alaska Airlines, thanks for the cards you gave me years ago. While they didn’t put a clutch in my stomach, they certainly got my heart and mind in gear. I should have thought to send you a transmission of thanksgiving for it. I slipped.<\/p>\n
PS: What makes those cards “prayer” cards?<\/p>\n
More of the story:<\/i> Alaska Airlines to stop handing out prayer cards to passengers<\/a><\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/god-gets-airplane.png\" "\\"god-gets-airplane\\"")
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