UCC-GCO
Please share this prayer for the children of Connecticut
Posted on: 12/14/2012 21:28
Please share this prayer for the children and for all those whose lives have been affected by Friday's elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.
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A Prayer for the Children
On Friday, December 14, 2012, 20 children were killed in a shooting rampage at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. Seven adults, including the gunman, also died at the scene. As the families and friends of the deceased mourn the loss of their loved ones, we pray for the children, and for all those whose lives have been affected by this tragedy.
Our hearts are broken.
Today, in the midst of holiday cheer,
we are painfully reminded of the cruelty and fragility of our lives together.
How do we live with such unimaginable grief?
How do we comfort such intolerable pain?
How do we care for each other in a world where violence seems so readily accessible?
Great comforter and protector,
We have no answers.
No words that can heal the broken heartedness we feel.
Yet you have promised to heal the broken hearted and to bind up their wounds.
We cling ardently to this assurance.
This is the world that Christ is born into;
A world bursting with broken-hearted people.
This is the world that you call us to sing, ‘Rejoice’ in.
The pain is too fresh, the wounds are too raw,
Yet still, we light the pink candle in anticipation of your fulfilled promises.
Until then,
we will continue to pray
For the parents,
For the families,
For the victims,
For the teachers,
For the first responders,
For the survivors, and
For all who have been crushed by this shooting.
We will hold them in our hearts.
We will strive to compassionately care for each other.
And, we will honor and lift-up our children,
For in them the light of Christ beams.
Amen.
Alydia Smith
The United Church of Canada
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Comments
somegalfromcan
Posted on: 12/15/2012 01:48
Amen
seeler
Posted on: 12/15/2012 07:45
Amen
gecko46
Posted on: 12/15/2012 09:50
AMEN!
crazyheart
Posted on: 12/15/2012 10:00
Amen
Inukshuk
Posted on: 12/15/2012 11:16
Thank you for this prayer. As one who will be lighting the candle of joy at church tomorrow morning, this will be a comforting preamble to the candle lighting liturgy.
waterfall
Posted on: 12/15/2012 11:57
Amen.
Beloved
Posted on: 12/15/2012 12:45
Amen.
graeme
Posted on: 12/15/2012 14:08
Amen, of course.
But 18 children died in that school.
How many children are killed every day by bombers, soldiers, drones in Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan? How may were killed in Iraq every day? Where were the prayers?
Aren't we assuming God is ours alone?
AaronMcGallegos
Posted on: 12/15/2012 15:20
Several folks have asked if we could keep this as a prayer thread, and save the discussion of the issues involved for other threads. Let's try that ok? Thanks.
Aaron for WonderCafe admin
GordW
Posted on: 12/15/2012 22:11
Most certainly:
God of life, God of laughter, God of death, God of tears,
Even as we pray for those families whose hearts break with an act that we honestly believe should be rare (though increasingly it is not) we also remember that hearts are breaking and broken all over the world on a daily basis.
We hold in prayer all those who live in places where children die. Places where children die because there is not food. Places where children die because the marketplace is wracked by a suicide bomb. Places where children die because they happen to be too close to a place that is deemed by someone to be a military target. Places where children die simply by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Places where children die simply because there is nobody willing or able to care for them properly. Places where chilldren die because...
God we read that list and our hearts ache for a world that sometimes feels too broken to ever be repaired.
We share the (appparently) idealistic dream that children somehow should be spared from the harsh realities of life. And yet we know it to not be true. And so, trusting in the hope of faith that the world can indeed be changed, we share the ancient words : Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.
MAy it be so. Amen
Pinga
Posted on: 12/15/2012 22:15
I offer a prayer for the perpetrator.
I offer a prayer for those who were related to those who do horrendous crimes.
I offer a prayer to all those who live with mental illness, or with those who have mental illness hoping their name will never be blasted across a news headline.
Finally, I offer a prayer to those who seek to help those who are unwell, who discover medicine, treatments, always striving to make the world just a wee bit better for all who walk this earth.
seeler
Posted on: 12/15/2012 23:18
Amen, and Amen.
carolla
Posted on: 12/15/2012 23:26
Thanks all.
And to pinga - I am so grateful for your acknowledgments.
GordW
Posted on: 12/16/2012 01:08
WE pray also for those in a variety of communities and circumstances for whom the coverage of this event has reawakend old hurts, has retraumatized them.
Dcn. Jae
Posted on: 12/16/2012 16:16
Amen, amen, amen.