Sundry

Ten more killed in a school shooting yesterday

Ten more, O God; what can I do?

1. Reach out to the law makers, call now for action
2. Gather in community for the call to gain traction
3. Join a gun control protest, take to the streets
4. Organize through social media with posts and with tweets
5. Pray for a way forward, if praying’s your thing
6. Try being more kind – there is much suffering
7. Don’t give it to thinking school shootings are normal
8. Let hope, truth, and kindness rise up from the turmoil
9. Learn the names of the dead, speak their names with great care
10. Keep hoping and striving, live not in despair

Ten more killed in a school shooting yesterday

Ten more, O god; what can I do?

Prayer for After Another School Shooting

[This prayer is based on one I delivered in 2009 for the mass shooting in Binghamton, NY where I live. It pains me to point out that with a simple alteration of the first paragraph’s details, the prayer is suitable for other mass shootings as well.]

May 20, 2018

We are broken, O God.  We are broken.  We gather in vigil again to mourn the death of school children and school teachers. On Friday, a young man entered the Santa Fe High School in Santa Fe, Texas, killed 10 people, physically injured 10 others, and spiritually shattered countless lives in that community and across the country.

Death and violence are the reasons that draw us together in sorrow, in anger, in anxious grief and loss.  Each of us has been touched by this or another recent shooting, some in a small way, others in overwhelming ways.  We gather together now to declare our allegiance to something stronger than violence and anger and even death.  O God we are broken, we long for healing and for hope.

Eternal Spirit, Loving God, Gracious One: we call on you in different ways and with different names, yet each in our own way – we call.  We pray for strength; we pray for healing.  We pray for the victims of violence.  We pray for the perpetrators of violence.  We pray for our community broken open in sorrow.  We pray for our leaders, for our first responders, and for the families and friends who must live with this into the next day and the next.  We pray for the peacemakers and the healers.  We pray for the teachers.  We pray for all those who seek a better way.

Grant us the courage to reject vengeance.  Grant us the courage to choose to heal what is broken and to redeem what cannot be healed, and to rebuild ourselves as a community of strength and hope.  Grant that we will be known not by our loss or by the violence of a moment, but rather by our loving response.  This I pray in the name of all that is holy, may it be so.  Blessed be and amen.

Eternal Spirit,

From Whom all things come

And to Whom all things return.

We gather this hour as a community of faith

seeking to transform our world through prayer and action.

seeking to transform our lives through justice and beauty and righteousness.

We pause together to reflect.

We reflect upon our times, our culture, and ourselves.

We reflect upon the needs of all people,

and upon our own needs and those of the people we love.

And yet, we gather this way every week,

and every week we work for and pray for

goodness and righteousness to triumph.

Every week we speak of the power of hope and of justice.

Every week we take one step more for peace.

And yet, every week there is registered in the media and in our lives

more tragedy, more injustice, more suffering.

And yet, every week the injustice and assault continue or rise anew.

O Spirit, hear our cry!

Help us to find hope against the embittering despair

to find strength to act in the face of continued injustice and apathy.

to find courage to still believe in those ideals of justice and beauty and righteousness.

Help us to reach out from our very being to transform the world

and to be transformed in ourselves.

Help us to know, despite the messy complexity of life,

that we do not labor in vain,

that peace will one day prevail,

that perseverance will be rewarded

and that hope is a powerful response in the face of such difficulty.

Be thou an ever present strength on the journey, O Spirit.

This we pray to the name of all that is holy

May it be so

I am recently returned from a sabbatical. I was able to slow down and (despite most of my time away happening during winter months) was able to get out into nature. This all reminds me of a quote from Thoreau of which I am fond.  The quote started with the line, “Nature never makes haste.”  In itself, that first line is compelling. We can be like nature; we, also, can learn to not make haste. It is a great sentiment. But Thoreau expands this idea as the full quote continues:

“Nature never makes haste. The wise man is restful, never restless or impatient.  He each moment abides where he is, as some walkers actually rest the whole body at each step, while others never relax the muscles of the legs till the accumulated fatigue obliges them to stop short.”

This could have dramatic implications for your life, don’t you think?

Do you strain every muscle at every moment to accomplish the task(s) you have set yourself, or do you rest your whole body in every moment?

Do you actually enjoy the moment you are in, or are you so busy that you miss it?

As I return to my regular schedule after having been away for a time, I already feel myself picking up speed.  We are often caught up in our rush to complete things in time or get things ready.  Multi-tasking is almost required to live in this world!

I hope you are able to actually rest your whole body at each step.  I wish for each of you (and for myself) the sense that every moment is already perfect and needs no preparation to be enjoyed.  There is rest in every step, joy in every step, a beautiful view waiting to be seen in every step.

And if slowing down is hard for you, or not a priority, or not a realistic option given your circumstances … I pray you will find that relaxation waiting for you when possible. Or perhaps that the moments of relaxation catch you if you will not pause to catch them.