Brazil

World News This Week in Prayer – Thurs., October 17, 2019

Be gentle with us, O Lover of Souls.
Be gentle with us, for surely in this fractured and fracturing world,
that above all is what we need:
To (re)learn to be gentle with ourselves.
To be gentle with each other.
To be gentle with our planet.

Be gentle with those – especially with those – who don’t seem to have a gentle bone in their bodies.
Be gentle with the United States, for abandoning their Kurdish allies; with the Turkish forces attacking the Kurds; with the country of Syria in the middle.
Be gentle with the owners of the Bangladesh clothing factory under investigation for abusing their workers.
Be gentle with the leaders of Venezuela, which just won a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council, despite their country’s own horrendous human rights violations.

Be gentle with those whom we cannot forgive.
Be gentle with the South Korean mastermind of the massive “dark web” child pornography marketplace who was arrested this week, along with 337 users of the site from 11 countries.
Be gentle with all who bully and abuse and terrorize, in the schoolyards, in our homes, in our workplaces, in our world.

Gentle them, Beloved, as you would gentle a wild horse.
As you would coax love from the strong muscles and striking hooves of the fearful and ranging stallion.

Be gentle with all who hurt, or weep, or mourn, or fear.
Be gentle with the survivors of Typhoon Hagibis in Japan.
Be gentle with those searching for survivors in the collapsed apartment building in Brazil.
Be gentle with the tens of thousands of migrants applying for asylum in Mexico, now that it appears that the U.S. will no longer be a possible place of refuge for them.

Wrap them in the tenderest love, Beloved, as you would a flurry of newborn kittens.
As you would make a nest of the softest blankets, in which to grow and heal and thrive.

Be gentle with our fragile Earth.
Be gentle with the students in Gambia protesting climate change, because one day, “my city Banjul could end up under water.”
Be gentle with Lebanon, facing the worst wildfires in decades.
Be gentle with Australia, where a growing drought is stirred up a dust storm so thick that day seemed to turn to night.
Be gentle with the lives we have built, with the lives we do not know how to sustain.

Help us to walk gently in our lands, in our lives.
As gently as a drop of dew on a morning flower.

Be gentle with us, O Lover of Souls.
But, oh, we do not need to ask.
For you are our Gentleness and our Beloved.

Amen.

World News in Prayer – Thursday, 19th September 2019

There is a voice ringing throughout the universe; throughout all space and time; seeking to reach our ears, to touch our hearts and souls.

Gracious God, help us to listen for Your voice, calming and clear, throughout the chaos of our frenzied lives, the voices in our heads, and the roaring sounds all around us. Help us to tune into you as we pray for our world.

Holy One, we listen for Your guidance in healing your world. We pray for resolution of political, economic and social paralysis and uncertainty affecting the UK and Europe over Brexit. We pray for the people of the Bahamas, who have a long road of recovery ahead after Hurricane Dorian turned their world upside down and the need for help seems endless. We also lift our hearts in prayer for Bermuda, where Hurricane Humberto knocked out the power for about 80% of the island.

We pray for all the places in the world that are burning, including Brazil and Bolivia, and Indonesia. We pray that we are given ears to hear the cries of your children, including those across the Globe who have organized the Climate Strike this Friday, September 20th..

Loving One, we listen for Your tranquility when the clamor of gun violence and missiles so often ring in our heads, even days, months, and years after we hear of them. We pray for change in the United States, where gun violence is so prevalent, particularly after the Sandy Hook Promise commercial has been released and gaining so much attention, seven years after the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary.

We pray for the Middle East, especially since the Saudi Arabia oil attacks, that they may experience healing rather than rage. We cry with those grieving in Afghanistan following the attacks by the Taliban yet again on civilians and now a hospital replicating the murderous attacks on hospitals in Syria. We pray for the protection and provisions for all seeking to help the wounded and vulnerable.

Help us tune into Your voice, O God, that we may live lives of true discipleship and carry out Your will to bring peace to this tumultuous world around us. Amen.

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, August 29, 2019

Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins. – 1 Peter 4:8

God of love, you created the world and everything in it. You created the beautiful rain forests, the colorful sunsets, the innumerable animals and leaving creatures, human beings, and most of all you created the love which flows through all of it. We see your hand in every living thing and we mourn as we see your creation lose life in all of its forms. Help us to be comforted by your incredible love and may it wash over every hurting being in this world.

May your love flow through, Oh Lord.

Lord, we ask that you be with your creation in the many places which are being destroyed. We pray for the Amazon rain forest as it burns away causing Brazil to be forever marked by destruction. We pray for all places where fire continually consumes your creation in Siberia, Indonesia, Greece, the United States, Russia, South Africa and so many other places in your world. We ask for your presence to be with your incredible trees, plants, and animals which are dying and in need of your healing. We ask that you be with all of those in the Caribbean and United States who are affected by hurricane Dorian. As your creation fears for the loss of life and homes we ask that you breathe life as well as hope back into your creation.

May your breath flow through, Oh Lord.

God of our hearts, may you release the anxieties which fill our world. Be with the people in Hong Kong as more troops are sent into the streets where your children work, play, and are trying to live. We pray for your people in the Jammu and Kashmir region of India as they contend with detention and as many suffer severe injuries. We ask that your love be spread also to the people at the border in the United States as your dear people suffer and many die as they are turned away. Lord, we ask that your love be spread throughout all regions where your dear people only long for safety and love in a world which is filled with conflict.

May your protection be a shield, Oh Lord.

God of us all, may you open our hearts to be filled with more love than divisiveness. May your love spread out as a calm breath, a protective shield, and a flowing stream. May you teach us all that while we may never know the right thing to do, we always know it is better to share your love rather than spread hate and violence in your creation. As you soothe all of your children’s hearts, may you continually teach us that above all else we shall only spread love which is a comfort to all things in all time.

Amen.

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, August 22, 2019

But ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of the air, and they will tell you; or speak to the earth, and it will teach you, or let the fish of the sea inform you. Which of all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind.
Job 12:7-10

God of all creation, we are aware of our mandate to care for the beauty you have given us, but we fail. From the Amazon rain forests and smoke-filled skies threatening Brazil to the official death of a glacier in Iceland, we have not listened to the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, or our planet Earth as it now moans in pain under the pressure of population and the technological advancement of human ways and human will over our Creator’s. God, we no longer know how to live simply and in harmony with your creation.

Divine Love, Hear our Prayer.

God of our very being and nature, we have to search deep into the news to find such inspiring stories as Switzerland teen Greta Thunberg who’s gone from solitary climate change protester to icon; or the perseverance of tech-savvy Iranians to stay connected for social good on social media despite regime restrictions; or the recent hero story in Canada where one man rushed to the aid of a United States family from New Jersey at a campground when a sick and dying wolf attacked them in their tent at night. We are made all too aware of the evil and sick parts of human nature, but it doesn’t seem to be leading to changes toward a more just and grace-filled world. The detention this week of a British consulate worker in China, ongoing nuclear proliferation in Russia and North Korea, and the more than 60 people killed after a bomb blast at a wedding in Afghanistan. There are children living in shipping containers in the United Kingdom and infants, toddlers, and teens remain in detention camps in the United States as new allegations of additional sexual assaults come to light. God, we are mistreating one another, your children of all ages, and we no longer know how to compassionately converse or have civil discourse.

Divine Love, Hear our Prayer.

Global concerns may have local impact, but we know there are many prayers that need to be heard from our various local communities and neighborhoods.

Whether it be in prayer for your entire creation, or well wishes for students, teachers, administrators, support staff as schools resume from break, or the addict down the street, or the upcoming mental health awareness initiatives, we wish to see things with new eyes, with passionate and respectful hearts of our neighbors and their needs. Help us to find the divine energy within us so that we may be representatives of your love, grace, kindness and compassion in your world. May it be so. Amen.

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, July 11, 2019

Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer

Lord, there is so much happening in our world we hardly know where to direct our attention and can only be grateful that you see all and answer the prayers of all your people. So we place in your hands our concerns for our environment from the high temperatures in Alaska to the increasing destruction of the Amazon rain forest in Brazil –
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer

When we celebrate the small step for man, the giant leap for mankind and Jodrell Bank becomes a world heritage site help us to remember we have only one world. As New Zealand increases it’s effort to eradicate invasive plant and animal species which threaten the extinction of most of it’s native ecology while scientists announce the identification of the seeds most likely to survive and adapt to climate change –
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer

With grief we read of the preventable deaths and suffering in Yemen; with shared sorrow we hear of the forcible detention of Uighur and children separated from parents in China; with mourning we learn of mass graves of migrants in Texas –
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer

For all in positions of power and those who hold authority, in church and state, industry and technology, for our politicians and government employees, civil servants, and judiciary –
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer

For the unexpected mercies that often don’t make the news, such as 2 major earthquakes in California without loss of life and with opportunities for scientists to study, we give thanks. For the small mercies of walking with friends, human and canine, for the gift of families and neighbours, for the enjoyment of our fragile blue planet we give thanks and praise.
Amen

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, April 25, 2019

Holy One,

Your Name is above all names, it is so high that we cannot attain it, yet still we seek it. And when we cannot find you, when we do not understand what is happening, when our hearts quake with fear and our spirits tremble with unknowing, when we stumble and search and seek after your face, a beloved face that seems so far from us, that is when YOU call us by name. As you did with Mary on Easter, you pierce through the mystery and call us, claim us, love us. As you did on Easter, you reveal that you are not removed from the world, but that you are here, with us, through death and life, in the tomb of decay and the garden of growth, you are with us here in the world.

Reveal yourself to us today.

Where we see violence and destruction in the bombings of churches throughout Sri Lanka, where we watch the aftermath of shootings, as in New Zealand, reveal the wings of your comfort, the shelter of your arms, the balm of your care.

Where we see vigilante militias along the United States border treat refugees and asylum-seekers as criminals, reveal the power of your justice, the commitments of your love, and the renewal of your protection.

Where we see the violence in Libya where hundreds are dying and over one thousand wounded in the battle for control of the capital, Tripoli, reveal your compassion and wisdom to bring these fighting factions to achieve peace for the country’s people.

Where we see the brutality of domestic abuse and the secrets of family pain, as with the family found in the cave in Spain, reveal to us how you grieve the loss of your children, how you rage at the ways we abuse each other or do not to see the abuse of each other, how you call us to commit again to caring for your vulnerable ones.

Where we see political protests in places around the word, like Sudan and Hong Kong, reveal how you lift up the lowly and bring down the mighty from their thrones. We know that not all shouting voices should be given the megaphone, yet we also know that what we think of as power and might, will pass away as grass in your sight.

Where we see the erosion of environment and the increasing anxiety over resources, with loss of rainforests in Brazil and months of drought in Australia, reveal how you have poured your care into every aspect of Creation, and how you demand that we more faithfully steward this world entrusted to us.

Where we see tragedy and death this week from the natural elements in the Philippines from earthquakes, landslides in Columbia and floods and mudslides in South Africa, reveal your consoling arms to surround these victims and their bereaved loved ones in love and strength to endure their loss.

Where we need to see your face, Lord, we pray that you will show up before us and remind us again that nothing, not even death, will separate us from you.

You have called to us before. Call to us now.

Amen sildenafil generique.

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, April 11, 2019

God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. ³⁰And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” –Genesis 1:29-30

What my grandparents did, we are doing now, not leaving footprints. You westerners must see what we are. We came to ask you to respect our culture. We came to ask you to come to our territory, if you respect us you will come. We do not want war as our ancestors did; we only want to be heard. We want peace, compassion and understanding. – Excerpt of Waorani women’s song in a courthouse in Ecuador to halt illegal oil drilling on their forested lands.

OH, God, our creator, you are listening to singing in this world. You hear crying and our pleas as well. You know our tears and feel our deep suffering. We call for your mercy on the many horrors of war, famine, displacement, imprisonment and inequality.

The movement of the wind across dry lands that thirst also carries Spirit. Nourish and protect the people of North Korea where one-third of the rice paddies have dried up in a 100-year drought. Give them hope. Call us to action in Puerto Rico where fresh water access is jeopardized and being rationed and in India where its population of 1.3 billion people will endure extreme water stress as ground water moisture is not being replenished. Awaken us to the drought in Sao Paulo, Brazil as people may be forced to flee, as de-forestation of the Amazon and long-term pollution of water leaves little to drink. Help us to discern a way through this global crisis. Help us to hear the words of our elders, teachers and wise-ones.

The movement of people where violence and economic deprivation require all manner of assistance. Holy Spirit dwell among the humanitarian partners receiving over 4.9 million people of which over 1 million are children as they are fleeing Venezuela coming to Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Panama, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago. We call for your mercies especially for unaccompanied children, for pregnant and nursing mothers. We pray that communities accept the foreigner, the stranger, the homeless and hungry. May loving acts transcend policies of closed borders.

The flight of people from the floods from Cyclone Idai and the extreme damage it has wrought is overwhelming. Sustain those providing humanitarian aid for the hundreds of thousands of people in the port of Beira, Mozambique as contaminated water spreads cholera. Sustain the Ministry of Health as infrastructure is severely disrupted. Bring an end to suffering, calm the anxious, the lost, the grieving, those that feel all hope is gone. Shelter the homeless of Zimbabwe and comfort the suffering of Malawi as the waters recede and the dead are grieved.

We pray for the Rohingya peoples fleeing Myanmar, many now forced by human trafficking cartels into cages in makeshift prisons in Malaysia and Thailand. Bring justice to these places and times, shield the suffering captives from further harm. We learn of the rapid rise in the building of prisons in China where over one million Muslims are thought to be imprisoned in the guise of re-education. Oh how troubled and in need of your mercy are we as a global community.

Prayers this day and into the night are like the lights that come on at evening, as darkness descends around the world. Bright of day clarity shifts to soft silhouettes as we tire, help up us to set down our burdens and worries, to give them to your powerful ways. May we remember to be grateful for what is and what is not, Oh, Lord, Father, Mother…Great One, Protector of all.

Help us to know you in our darkest nights and in the blinding glare of midday. We pray for the victims of genocide in Syria where 500,000 are dead and where the UN has documented evidence of mass killings and the targeting of Syrian children by its own government for brutal torture and slaughter. We pray too for the people of Libya where dozens, including civilians have died and nearly two hundred wounded in recent days in rebel fighting in the capital Tripoli. So much anguish and misery, deep unendurable loss, and yet we find our way forward with prayers for reconciliation and peace. We honor the 800,000 dead remembering the violence of Rwanda twenty-five years later. As nations stood by, terror and genocide born out of hate speech rolled over the land. We grieve in this world of sorrow. Teach us to love, to forgive. We call upon you, Oh Lord; to bless our mouths with words of kindness, give our hands energy for healing and tenderness. Console the orphan and widowed. Bring wisdom to our leaders such that these atrocities do not happen. Open our eyes to the cost of anger, fear and hatred.

In our grasping and avoiding of Your Will, remind us that indeed Your Work is to be done here on this earth as in the heavens. May we hear in this moment, in this Lenten season your eternal call to us to love as Christ loved us, as he taught us to turn the other cheek, to befriend the widow, visit the prisoner and cherish our children. Awaken us to what it means to receive Living Water. Deepen our will to serve and love one another. Amen.

World News This Week in Prayer – Thursday, March 14, 2019

[God] brought [Abram] outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” ~ Genesis 15:5

God of abundance, we know that you are able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine, and yet our prayers are limited by the boundaries of our human imagination. We pray for small mercies when you offer overflowing grace. We ask for minor alleviation of suffering when you offer true justice. We meekly request a reduction in violence when you offer universal and eternal peace. Help us to put our trust in you so that the shaping of our world might be guided by your wisdom and your love rather than our own limited human perspective. Make us bold to pray that your will be done in all ways and in all places in all of your creation:

Workers race to rescue school children trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building in Lagos, Nigeria, and the community of Suzano in Brazil mourns the loss and grief caused by a shooting in a local school. All 157 passengers and crew sadly lost their lives after a Boeing crashed just after take-off in Ethiopia and the death toll rises in heavy rains and flooding in Malawi. In the face of such tragedy, we pray for small signs of hope and individual miracles, forgetting that you are able to transform our world so that suffering and fear and hate of all kinds might cease. May your will be done so that grace and love might abound in our world.

The governor of California, USA, has placed a temporary halt on death penalty executions, and Cardinal George Pell has been sentenced to jail for sexual abuse crimes in Australia, but we fail to see a path toward true righteousness in our social systems and in our institutions. May your will be done so that your justice might guide us in our community relationships.

Investigators have found evidence of extreme ethnic violence in DR Congo, the world watches as North Korea once again represents a threat through their construction of rocket-launching facilities, and we watch and despair as persistent clashes continue to kill soldiers and innocents in Yemen and Afghanistan. Our prayers so often are limited to asking for an end to violence, but your vision for the world is one of peace beyond anything we can imagine. May your will be done so that your shalom of safety, peace, and unity might prevail.
A white supremacist attacked two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, killing 49. Live videos of the horrendous gun slaughter were aired around the world on social media. We wonder how many vicariously enjoyed the violence, how many want to imitate, how many deepened their commitment to prevent it. Even as our hearts break with those who have lost their loved ones, even as we pray, we wonder how a good God could fail, over and over, to stop this horror. May your will be done, so we can join you in bringing peace out of darkness, new life out of death, compassion out of bigotry.

Like Abram, O God, we question your promises, wondering if the coming of your kingdom is even possible. Give us the faith to follow you and trust in your covenant with us. Despite all obstacles, fill us with your vision of how the world ought to be so that we might be bearers of hope and small glimpses of that which is to come. As Abram prayed for a son but learned that your promises would exceed his imagination, so too may we learn to pray beyond our wildest dreams so that we can participate in the depth and truth of your plans for all of us and for all of creation. Amen.

World News This Week in Prayer, Thursday, February 28, 2019

Longing for light, we wait in darkness.

Longing for truth, we turn to you.

Make us your own, your holy people,

Light for the world to see.

Christ, be our light! Shine in our hearts.

Shine through the darkness.

Christ, be our light! Shine in your church gathered today.

Words and music by Bernadette Farrell

Tune: Christ, Be Our Light

O God, there are days when the light seems dim, when our hearts are torn apart, and so we come to you in prayer for:

those within the United Methodist Church in the United States whose hearts are breaking over the decision to continue to forbid same-sex marriages and the ordination of LGBTQIA clergy;
those whose lives are breaking due to toll that clergy sex-abuse within the Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist churches has taken on them;
and those who continue to use your Name and Word to bludgeon others into submission to their way of believing.

For all these children of yours, we pray for your light to shine and grant them hearts of compassion and peace;

God of grace, hear us.

O God, there are days when the light seems almost gone, when our hearts are confused and angry, and so we come to you in prayer for:

the leaders of the United States and North Korea who are meeting in Vietnam to discuss denuclearization;
the parliament of Britain as they struggle with a decision regarding Brexit;
the government of Venezuela, as they destroy humanitarian aid at the border with Brazil, preventing it from reaching their people who are in desperate need;
the governments of India and Pakistan, as animosity and military action between the two countries escalates.

For all these children of yours, we pray for your light to shine and grant them hearts of wisdom and justice;

God of grace, hear us.

O God, there are days when the light begins to shine again and our hearts are filled with hope, and so we come to you in prayer for:

the House of Representatives of the United States voting to invalidate the emergency declaration regarding border security;
the on-going work of the American Civil Liberties Union to prevent further separation of families at the U.S.-Mexico border and to re-unite families already separated;
the courageous young people, continuing the March for Our Lives Movement and the countless women worldwide in the #MeToo movement, all working to shine the light on the need for gun control and on sexual abuse.

For all these children of yours, we pray that your light continues to shine to grant them hearts of courage and daring;

God of grace, hear us.

For all these people and situations, we pray, confident in your hearing, healing presence in our lives and in our world, as we sing:

Many the gifts, many the people,

Many the hearts that yearn to belong.

Let us be servants to one another,

Signs of your kingdom come.

Christ, be our light! Shine in our hearts.

Shine through the darkness.

Christ, be our light! Shine in your church gathered today.

Amen. Let it be so.

World News in Prayer – Thursday, 14th February 2019

Creator God,

It doesn’t seem enough to say we thank you for the beauty of your creation. When we think of all that happened from the growth of our planet, its place in the solar system and the most we can say is “thanks”. You know the gratitude of our hearts, the deep meaning we want to place on these words, you accept and understand. Thank you, our God.

This week Lord, the doomsayers have been out in force: the increasing loss of the icecaps and glaciers; the effect of insecticides, even those long banned, on all insects; the threat to wildlife from dogs and domestic cats turned feral. Then a sliver of good news: NASA satellite data shows an increase in leaf area on plants and trees across the amazon; India and China are planting major areas with trees.

This week, a teenager in Ohio, USA has used technology to research vaccinations and has now received them. Teenagers in Bristol, England have researched the bus boycott of 1963 and discovered their missing history. For the power of the internet for good we give thanks.

This week, emergency supplies pile up and rot in Hudayah, Yemen and on the Columbia / Venezuela border, we pray that warring politicians will see the harm they do in power struggles and the power of the internet will become good for their countries.

This week as more warnings about dams holding toxic sludge emerge and other industrial mining problems become widely known we pray for the people of Brazil and the open cast mining areas of Appalachia, USA.

This week, Lord, help us to understand what we have done to our planet and how we need to make changes in our lives. Wild fires have burned across Tasmania, Australia and New Zealand; the effects of last autumn’s fires still devastate lives across California, USA; floods across Chile and Northern Australia; from Cincinnati to California, USA we recognise the multiple environmental crisis across the world.

We give thanks for the many small steps being taken by individuals and groups across the world to highlight and tackle this. Machynlleth, Wales has become the first town in Wales to declare a “climate emergency”, following the example of others globally. It is focussing on measures to dramatically reduce its carbon footprint. Villagers in Jenjarom, Malaysia are fighting to have the government close illegal factories dealing with Western rubbish poisoning their land, water and air.

The heavens declare your glory, God. Help us rediscover the sacred in our world and environment which you have made so we “touch the earth lightly”*.

Thank you for hearing our prayer and for your answers.

Amen

*”Touch the Earth lightly” – (New Zealand), Lyrics: Shirley Erena Murray Music: Tenderness – Colin Gibson