World in Prayer

Sharing in God’s loving compassion for all

Prayers for Palestine

Palestine is held in these prayers through war and displacement, hunger in Gaza, shelter and sanitation that fail in winter, and aid that does not arrive. Recognition and statehood come up repeatedly, as do ceasefires made and broken. Through all of it the prayers ask for a peace that lasts and for trust between neighbors.

Have Mercy: A Prayer After Bishop Budde’s Plea, for USAID and a Wounded World (February 20, 2025)

Introduction to the prayer:  (If prayer is used in a worship service, the people, the congregation, read aloud the bold print.) Just over a month ago, the day after Donald Trump’s inauguration, The Right Reverend Mariann Budde, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington D.C., USA  delivered a sermon at the Washington Cathedral as a prelude […]

Am I My Brother’s Keeper: A Prayer for Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Detained Migrants (February 13, 2025)

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Prayers for the Ones Jesus Blessed: The Washington DC Air Crash, Ebola in Uganda, and Goma (January 30, 2025)

Loving God, it is sometimes difficult to find the words to pray when our hearts and souls feel weary about all that is happening in our world.  We look for comfort and hope, but sometimes the situations that surround us need a miracle. As we come to you in prayer this week, let us remember […]

Do You Believe This: Prayers for Christian Unity, Gaza, the Uyghurs and a Warming World (January 23, 2025)

Writer’s Note:  Every year, the northern hemisphere recognizes a Week of Prayer for Christian Unity between 18 January and 25 January.  This focus on Christian unity recognizes Jesus’ prayer in John chapter 17 that the church “may all be one … so that the world may believe.”  For 2025, Christians around the world were encouraged […]

Here Am I, Send Me: A Prayer on 18 Billion Dollars, Election Spending and Global Inequality (November 7, 2024)

Great Mystery, In the first waking moments of the day, it feels like the world is soft, untrammeled, freshly made and yet soon it seems to twist and turn surprising us, horrifying us, challenging us, asking us “who are we listening to?”  From Isaiah 6:8 these words:  Then I heard the voice of the Lord […]

Glimmers of Grace: Prayers for Elections, Gaza, the Spanish Floods and Sudan’s Women (October 31, 2024)

Loving God, We know that our world is often uncertain. Many nations have recently faced elections, such as British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and New Brunswick in Canada, and Japan, where the Liberal Democratic Party, which has held power almost continually since 1955, lost its single-party majority at Sunday’s election. We also know that in some places, elections […]

Do Not Conform to the Pattern of This World: Prayers for Gaza, Beirut, Cuba and the Travel Moon (October 24, 2024)

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is —his good, pleasing and perfect will. — Romans 12:2 O Lord, renew our minds and with that clarity set us toward your perfect will. […]

In the Way of Saint Francis: Prayers for the World’s Poorest Nations and 120 Million Displaced (October 3, 2024)

We center ourselves in prayer with you O Lord. The feast day of Francis of Assisi (1182-1226) is October 4.  We pray on how he modelled humility, concern for poor people; practicing a vow of poverty, peace and nonviolence, and care for creation for generations to come. Born into a wealthy Italian merchant family, Francis […]

A World Without School Shootings: A Prayer After Georgia and for Migrants in the Channel (September 5, 2024)

God of all seasons, of all people, of each other… may we be lifted into a new season and a new way of being in your world. A world without school shootings, as another has just taken place in Georgia, United States. A world without war and conflict, as this past week a 16-year old […]

Let God’s People Go: A Prayer Remembering the Slave Trade and All Held Captive Today (August 22, 2024)

Editor’s note: 23 August is recognized by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) as the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition. This date was chosen as an acknowledgement of the revolution in Saint Domingue, today the Republic of Haiti, that began in late August 1791 as a […]