Prayers for the United States

Prayers naming the United States have followed storms, tornadoes, wildfires and floods across many states, along with elections and political tension, gun violence, and questions of migration and race. Health, mental health and the well-being of ordinary households appear often, as do thanksgivings for its landscapes and wild places.

Who Is So Hurt I May Not Know Their Heartache: After the California Oil Spill (May 21, 2015)

“Who is so hurt I may not know their heartache?” asks the old hymn I Would Be True. We pray today for the heartbreak of the world. For the heartbreak of those who struggle with over 100 thousand gallons of oil poured from a broken pipeline…who struggle with the devastating effects on one of the […]

Love One Another: Prayers After the Pakistan Helicopter Crash and Oklahoma Tornadoes (May 8, 2015)

Jesus said, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” God of Love and Light and Life, God of All Time and No Time, sometimes the demands of everyday life just overtake us and we forget, we lose track, we neglect those things to which we have committed ourselves- […]

The Sacred Among Us: Prayers for Nepal’s Displaced and for Mothers Everywhere (May 7, 2015)

In all our joys and in all our concerns, may we be ever mindful of the presentness of the sacred among us, and to see new possibilities of the now. Creativity God, be our guide in re-imagining our human institutions of government. As the United Kingdom‘s parliament undergoes a change and the United States continues to […]

Prayer Tree: After the Nepal Earthquake, the Baltimore Riots, and Chile’s Calbuco Volcano (April 30, 2015)

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. – Romans 12: 12 I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my understanding; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my understanding. -1 Cor 14: 14 – 16 Pray continually – 1 Thessalonians […]

This We Can Do, We Can Pray: For Yemen, Chile’s Volcano, and Ethiopian Christians (April 23, 2015)

We have come to worship you, Lord our Shepherd. You, Lord, are our shepherd. Like any shepherd you watch over us, lead us to the best pastures of the mind, the best waters for the spirit, and like sheep we follow. Sheep are not stupid and neither are we. Forgive us our tendency to act […]

Lift Up the Light of Your Countenance: For Migrants Drowned Near Italy and for Yemen (April 16, 2015)

Many are saying, “Oh, that we might see better times!” Lift up the light of your countenance upon us, O LORD. – Psalm 4:6 In this season of resurrection, lift up the light of your countenance upon us, O Lord, that we may see your risen Son, Jesus Christ, who walks with us, […]

Even Today Light Is Still Being Created: After the Garissa University Attack (April 9, 2015)

Loving God, we pray for the opportunity to join you in the work of creation. The Bible declares that creation occurred first with light, when the world was full of emptiness and disorder. We look around and see disorder of our own time: in the United States, we are shocked by the cell phone recording […]

We Live in the In-Between Times: An Easter Prayer After Garissa and for a Thirsty Planet (April 3, 2015)

It is the in-between time. At my church, we have just ended the Maundy Thursday service, remembered Jesus’ institution of the first Eucharist, been commanded to love as he loves us, washed one another’s feet, then stripped the altar. Tonight, Jesus will spend in agonizing prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, and we, his disciples, will try […]

The Violence of Love: Prayers After the Germanwings Crash and for Ebola-Hit West Africa (March 26, 2015)

Archbishop Oscar Romero was murdered at the altar in a hospital chapel 25 years ago. He wrote: “We have never preached violence, except the violence of love, which left Christ nailed to a cross, the violence that we must each do to ourselves to overcome our selfishness and such cruel inequalities among us. The violence […]

For God So Loved the World: A Lenten Prayer of Wonder and Hope (March 12, 2015)

World News in Prayer for March 12, 2015 For God so loved the world… Gracious and holy one, God of all creation, God of all people everywhere, it is so easy, as we journey through this season of Lent, to get lost in the wilderness of pain and sorrow we see in the world […]