Body Prayer
Stand with your feet rooted into the earth. Bring your hands together in a prayer position at your heart. Bow bending at your waist.
A bow of reverence, of gratitude, of praise, of seeing.
From the bow take your arms wide open, hands open like to receive another in a hug.
Seeing and blessing.
Bring what you have gathered into a hug. Wrapping your arms across your chest.
Holding what you see and feel close in love, in prayer.
Lift your arms above your head.
Release all you hold into the wide arms of God’s love.
——-
We bring our hands together and bow…
To the Holy One, God of the firefly and fiery forest, of the monarch and milkweed, the born and unborn. The God of each created one. The God who is with us in our awe and anguish. We bow in reverence, praise, gratitude, and longing. We bow, resting into your vast mercy.
We open our arms wide. Our sight extends, we see and reach to bless…
- The people of Ukraine.
- 53 migrants from Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala who died in a semi-truck on the US/Mexico border. For their families who grieve, for the many who currently cross, who think of crossing, for the complex political situation across borders.
- Those in the United States who feel rage, fear, and concern of more personal freedoms being taken away after Roe v. Wade was overturned this week.
- The release of the 300 detained LGBTQ activists in Istanbul, Turkey, and see the continued struggle for equal rights.
- Those killed in a prison riot blaze in Colombia.
- The youngest children in the United States who celebrate that they are now able to be vaccinated against COVID. We see the many, globally, yet without this access.
- Tomato farmers in Tanzania who are struggling with a fertilizer shortage as they try to grow food during a global food crisis.
- The people of Bangladesh where floods have left dozens dead and 4 million people stranded.
- Honey bees in Australia affected by a deadly parasite.
- Those suffering due to an unprecedented heatwave in Japan.
- The creativity of Brazilian scientists who are turning tree bark into a promising treatment for leukemia.
We bring our arms in to hold close all these cherished of God…
Then we lift our arms and release them into the wide Presence of God…
Feeling the energy flow from our limbs.
All the longings of our hearts and the ache of our bodies.
All the news we read, all the pain we hear of and see.
May all bodies and hearts know the release into Love, into the Freedom
Where we can proclaim the words of Julian of Norwich
“All will be well and all will be well, all manner of things will be well.”
Where we can say, “all is well”
our feet rooted into the earth, Amen.
Leave a Reply