A War on Prayer? Why These People Have to Pay to Pray

Thousands are outraged following T-Mobile's decision to start charging people who use free conference lines to pray. 

T-Mobile markets itself as the "Uncarrrier," a phone service with no extra fees. However, the carrier was fined $48 million last year for false advertising after charging $0.01 per minute to use these free lines. 

The fee also applies to other 'free' conference lines used by businesses, not just those used for prayer.

However, churches and ministries spend millions of minutes each month on the phone in prayer, and while the fee seems low, it's having a negative impact.

"We've seen an immediate drop in the prayer that is happening on our network," says Dave Erickson, President of freeconferencecall.com. "My duty is to raise awareness because this prayer in happening on conference call lines in a virtual world."

The carrier considers these conference calls "out-of-plan" and thus subject to extra charge, but critics aren't buying that explanation. 

Many are joining Erickson's efforts to raise awareness. The organization Freedom to Pray launched a grassroots movement to petition and boycott T-Mobile. 

"This movement provides a means of response for faithful prayer warriors and individuals and groups who support them to advocate against T-Mobile and on behalf of keeping prayer lines free for everyone, including people of all faiths," the organization says on their website.

David Butts, chairman of the board for the National Day of Prayer sees these charges as an attack on prayer. 

"I am appalled by this absolute grab for money over people's freedom to pray via phone," Butts said. "I look at this as T-Mobile wanting to profit off of prayer, literally inhibiting people's right to pray freely. Somehow corporate executives who are all about the bottom line are looking for ways to infringe on people's rights to worship. I really do see it as a war on prayer."

However,T-Mobile says the issue is much simpler. 

"This policy is not a change to our existing calling plans; these calls have always been considered out-of-plan. These calls tend to cost more for T-Mobile to complete and this helps us to manage those costs," the company says.