Thoughts and Prayers

There is a kind of energy in prayer
that lifts a body up and off the grime…
and fervent wishes, too, and fare-thee-wells…
and every one that’s given, each received,
makes light the one whose chariot is air.
So never slight the usefulness of prayer
in healing and escorting one to flight,
as long as the intention is sincere
and not an empty promise or cliché,
as long as there are love and earnest hope—
enough to drown a cynic’s weary doubt—
as long as there’s a flame within the heart
and faith to thwart the candle’s burning out.
Send thoughts and prayers, oh, send this very hour
to those who suffer, those whose spirits fail
a burst of happiness, a gust of cheer,
a surge of certainty of higher things…
and let them be the energy that lifts
a body up and sets it on the breeze;
yes, let them be the wind beneath their wings
that flows unfailingly to joy and peace.

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From Hopelessness to Heaven

The Testament and Death of Moses, Luca Signorelli, 1482

Divine Beloved, open my heart to your Truth… now that there is room for music… now that I have realized that I had wasted my precious hours and years on earth fearing doom,
inclined toward death…
when I judged and withheld forgiveness…
when I scolded self and others, drowning out angel whispers and celestial songs…
when I despised my guides and teachers… and myself…
when I was harsh and lacked compassion…
when I felt weak and burdensome to this groaning world…
when I betrayed myself and sought approval for my false image…
when I craved prominence and admiration…
when I gave away my ease and my magnificence…
when I forgot to celebrate your bright and manifest gifts….
I heard you through the chaos: Peace; be still.

Surely, you promised, surely I am with you always. [1]

Trust me in the depths of your being…. I am with you and within you…. Quiet your mind in my presence… and hear [my]… blessing:
Peace be with you. [2]

I listened and I heard; but it was not always so. So long I called to you and waited for serenity, but it eluded me. Like the psalmist I cried out to you:

To the God of my salvation,
I called for help by day;
I cried out in the night:
Let my prayer come before thee,
for my soul is full of troubles and the Pit would devour me.
I have no strength,
like one forsaken among the dead,
like those whom you remember no more,
those who are cut off from your hand.
In regions dark and deep I lie; I am overwhelmed.
I have become a thing of horror…
shut off so that I cannot escape.
Every day I call upon you; I spread out my hands to you.
Do you work wonders for the dead?
Do fallen spirits rise up to praise you?
Is your steadfast love declared in the grave?
Is your saving love known in the land of darkness?
Why have you cast me off?
Why is your face hidden from me?
Afflicted and close to death, I am in terror;
I am helpless, drowning in confusion and dread, which would destroy me; they close in on me,
surrounding me like a flood all day long.
Lover and friend shun me;
my companions are in darkness. [3]

Divine Beloved, how the road seemed long and treacherous, though at my creation you had spread before me from the mountaintop a green and gently rolling plain, blue ovals and racing curls of water, distant hills all forested with pine, chattering cottonwoods lining level pathways, mighty eagles in flight, swift deer in meadows and thick aspen groves.
No blighted hills and wastelands did you point to, no grieving storms, no desolation.
You revealed clouds, light and buoyant with the promise of refreshing rain. Crops were thriving in the fields; sheep and cattle grazed at will.

You witnessed my pain and offered me the balm of Gilead;
you spoke to me of peace and healing; I would not hear.
You quelled my stubbornness and redeemed me from the pit.
You taught me to face hardship, to be steadfast in its cold and empty gaze,
to grapple with misfortune, soul to ego;
to be bold in the face of troubles’ bold impertinence;
to unmask the friend or mentor in adversity.

At length, O Father-Mother God, through your mercy I began to notice shape and form within the void…
to give attention to hue and texture in the creeping dawn…
to wonder at the workmanship of shrubs and shirts and shoes and grand pianos.
I began to see how this thing cleaves to that by way of growth or glue or clever carpentry, or by simply wanting to be one with loveliness or stillness or profound compassion and moving toward it, bold or shy.
I was a novice at it, more accustomed to attend to what isn’t here and likely won’t be in an hour or twenty-four.
I was like a tender seedling in the morning after frost.
By day and night I pray for sure footing on dew-slicked grass,
that I might offer water to the thirsty,
encouragement and guidance to the wanderer.
Through your grace I seek clear vision for the something like a destination;
soft landings for inevitable stumbles;
and small arrivals, breath by breath.

And your voice slides neatly through pandemonium: Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. [4]

I asked, Divine Beloved, How can I pray this fear away…
this sense of dissolution, cell by cell and bone by bone,
one digit at a time or all at once?

I cried, How can I, when I don’t know what’s gone missing,
what precise adhering bits of tissue steered my thoughts and guarded my emotions on a sweeter, leveler path;
what benevolent vibrations, pulses, energies have kept me wakeful
and expressed a cosmic gentleness whose source, so little understood,
would become forever cherished?

Dear God, I searched to know what I had taken for granted when I ought to have been grateful;
when it seemed my body had betrayed me. Where, I asked, was Spirit? How concealed?
Perceived as altar or as steeple, or disguised in humble blessings holding all the secrets of divinity?

I confess that I have judged, mistrusted, or ignored the sacred heart of what is elfin, elephantine, or invisible. To perceive myself as anything at all, I fabricated a counterfeit of me, as unobjectionable as organic textiles, artisan-constructed, not beautiful, not ugly, but unused,
instead of draped across a pair of chilly shoulders and a thinly covered back
for an hour’s warmth and comfort, maybe more.

I confess that my love, imperfect and sporadic even when spontaneous, without agenda,
struggled, poorly tended and quickly reabsorbed;
lay inert in my unworthiness…
the smoky aura radiating bleakly from the embers of my heart
into eternity.

But I have heard your promise and have clung to it as to a mast in a hurricane:

In the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.
And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water.
In the habitation of dragons… shall be grass with reeds and rushes.
And a highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness;
And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. [5]

In that fearsome hurricane there seemed a force that kept the pieces in the solitary unit known as me from cleaving as when I was made. Tormenting thoughts in neon hues could penetrate with ease the feeble bonds of molecules and atoms, and off I went, like sparks from green wood, failing, failing to adhere, flickering out in the pallid sky. The eyes, wherever they might rest, were helpless to regain the whole, and off I went in shards or streaks or grotesque shapes or formlessly… fleeing particles of the unit I once recognized as me.

They were of the lie, I knew… but why? Who benefits, and in what way? All that occurred to me is I, because the day is short and even now the shadows lengthen; in the dark there is no certainty.

And Truth replied, It is YOUR light that midnight lacks.

O Father-Mother, I confess: Your nature is perplexing in my bereavement. This I know: You live in me; my native purity is Love, and all I need. But even in that certainty, I have felt orphaned and adrift in something near insanity.

And so did I approach you, child to parent, willing to surrender all in order to be reassembled into your intention for me. And you heard my plea:

Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.
Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy holy spirit from me.
Restore in me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with thy free spirit. [6]

Creator of all things seen and unseen, I cried, what is this somber heaviness in my heart?

Enlighten me, O God. Dispel the lie of darkness with eternal truth.
You have not created fear, antipathy, confusion, rage.
You have left no defects or omissions in the spirit.
Open my eyes to beautiful and eternal love, truth, and wholeness, which are the nature of all creation.
When earthquakes of the emotions seem to shatter peace, swaddle my heart and mind in safety and serenity.
Then, calm and radiant, may I become an instrument of your peace. Anoint me as a physician of holiness, spreading not toxicity but health and divine order.
May my thoughts, speech, and actions proceed from robust joy planted and nurtured in sentient beings by you, O God of grace.
Make clear and shining the vision of all good, however swathed in mist it might appear.
Stimulate my timid inclination to pray without ceasing… to walk in uninterrupted conversation with you, my holy parent, comforter, and guide.

Divine Beloved, open my heart to your love.

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal.
And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
If I give away all I have, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;
does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil;
does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;
bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.
And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. [7]

O Fount of Love, I have known nothing so miraculous as the complete surprise of finding myself made new, in a cloister of astonishing love for which there was no precedent in my experience. I lacked vocabulary for the glories of the great beyond, so long beguiling, out of focus, unattainable … the indistinct eternity of Spirit, a destination I had cherished less than attention and esteem.

By your grace immersed in love, I knew only how to float and be patient through the storms at sea.
Is this the place, I wondered then, where faith, despair, and mystery collide, and would I in the aftermath discover where power lay instead of choosing the idiom of pain that most resembled peace?
Impatient, in a mirage I paddled fruitlessly. The sea is wide; there seemed no light to guide my navigation; I was beyond the urgency of time and tide, yet I knew a buoyancy and wondered: Was it hope or mockery?
For still I clung to mortality and cried into the void,

Is cruelty the grim default and struggle the essential posture,
or does complete surrender breach all barriers and allow a healing wind to embrace the one essential self?

But you, all-knowing, saw beyond the slender orbit, where clashed fire and ice and hopelessness, to beauty, victory, and the infinite embrace.

All substance, intelligence, wisdom, being, immortality, cause, and effect belong to [you]….. No wisdom is wise but [your]… wisdom; no truth is true, no love is lovely, no life is Life but the divine; no good is but the good [you bestow]…. [8]

I watched with you and witnessed how no ground is gained without a daring leap into the stratosphere, where deathless joy and endless love astound.

Worship me, you gently said, in the beauty of holiness. I created beauty to declare the existence of my holy being… to proclaim my presence in the world…. Even before you knew [my name]… you responded to my creation with wonder…. [The universe is filled with my radiance. Declare my glories to the world.] [9]

And [the people]… called to one another, Holy, holy, holy is God Almighty; the whole earth is full of God’s glory. [10]

---

[1] Matthew 28:20

[2] Sarah Young, Jesus Calling, p. 222

[3] Adapted from Psalm 88

[4] Isaiah 30:21

[5] Isaiah 35: 6-10

[6] Psalm 51: 6-12

[7] I Corinthians 13: 1-8, 13

[8] Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 275

[9] Sarah Young, Jesus Calling, p. 221

[10] Isaiah 6:3

 

May They Dance Again

The Wedding Dance, Pieter Brueghel the Elder, 1566

Song for the Twenty-Fifth Day of Lent

Father-Mother, God of life, restore now strength and health
as thy children pray for mercy at thy holy well.
Wash them with this sacred water—
mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters—
wipe the tears from every face;
feed their hunger by thy grace.

May angel voices out of heaven shout a great amen.
May the hands be healing hands that minister to them.
May the eyes that see their pain be soft like April’s first warm rain.
May kindness be the cup they drink, and may they dance again.

Father-Mother, let them hear thine own majestic voice,
soothing or resounding o’er the tumult and the noise.
May the lighting and the thunder
tell of signs and speak of wonders.
Sing to those who bow before thee
songs of victory and glory.

May angel voices out of heaven shout a great amen.
May the hands be healing hands that minister to them.
May the eyes that see their pain be soft like April’s first warm rain.
May kindness be the cup they drink, and may they dance again.

What Is the Good News?

El Greco, Christ Healing the Blind

Meditation for the Thirteenth Day of Lent

Shake thyself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem. (Isaiah 52:2)

HOPE AND NEW LIFE. Turn away from evil and embrace the Good News.

Christ really has been raised from death—the first one of all those who will be raised. Death comes to people because of what one man did. But now there is resurrection from death because of another man. I mean that in Adam all of us die. And in the same way, in Christ all of us will be made alive again. (I Corinthians 15:20-22)

ETERNAL LIFE. The body dies and decays; the spirit lives on.

I gave you the message that I received. I told you the most important truths: that Christ died for our sins, as the Scriptures say. (I Corinthians 15:3)

FREEDOM. If we had to pay a fine for every unkind thought or angry word, we would all live in a culvert. But, having done the best we can to right our wrongs, we needn’t carry guilt and shame around with us, punishing ourselves for our sins and hating our sinfulness. Indeed, these take a toll on our bodies as well as our hearts and minds. They paralyze our ability to love. In Christ we are given innocence at any time we choose to claim it. In the resurrection we are set free to experience joy, which blesses us and all whom we encounter.

Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.” (Matthew 11:4-5)

HEALING. Physicians have told me they see miracles all the time. That the body inclines toward healing is a miracle in itself. The body and mind want to be healthy. Torn skin scars over, and scars fade. Broken lives are mended. Broken relationships are restored. These are laws of nature lived through Christ.

“In the winter, seeing a tree stripped of its leaves, and considering that within a little time, the leaves would be renewed, and after that the flowers and fruit appear, he received a high view of the Providence and Power of God, which has never since been effaced from his soul.” (Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God)

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” (Isaiah 52:7)

VICTORY. God is supreme. Good is greater than evil. If we didn’t believe this in one form or another, we wouldn’t be able to get out of bed. Every minute of every day would be lived in dread of calamity.

I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world. (John 16:33) Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:15)

PEACE. Much misery arises when we try to control everything—ourselves, other people, circumstances…. Who, having gained a measure of power, does not seek even greater power? When we realize how little we can truly control, we can lean on the infinite strength of God. Thus are we free to live and love in this moment.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23)

HAPPINESS. The Spirit brings “mystic sweet communion” with Almighty God. By sowing its seeds, in prayer and meditation, we will harvest well-being in all its spiritual dimensions. Having that, what more can we ask? What else do we need for happiness?

Jesus replied, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22:37-40)

LOVE. We don’t have to wait for love to rush in and sweep us off our feet. You and I can make a decision to walk in the way of love… the love of God, the love of others, and the love that our Sunday-school teachers failed to mention: the love of ourselves. There is nothing noble or generous about neglecting our own needs or being easily manipulated.

Jesus “did not command self-love; he assumed it and made it the measure of neighbor love: ‘As you would that men do to you, do so to them.’” (John Piper, desiringgod.org)

And Showed the Face of God

Pietro Perugino, Polyptych Albani Torlonia, c. 1491

Why was the holy child born?
Why did Divinity adopt
a human form and walk the hills
of Galilee? Why did he lift
the weak and heal the blind, why did
he cleanse the lepers, cast out demons?
Why did Jesus Christ speak truth
to power, hastening his own
demise? The world would never be
the same, because this wise and gentle
prophet told the multitudes
to set aside the ancient laws,
obeying just this one: Be love.
And in the groves and orchards, on
the mountainsides; along the shore
and in the desert; in the temple
and among the poor, despised,
despairing—those whom he called brother,
sister, child—this carpenter
who owned no property except
the garment that he wore, the sandals
on his feet, gave all: love, hope, mercy…
life and breath… the promise of
Emmanuel—God with us; God
within us. Those whom he restores
to innocence are rich indeed,
beyond the grasp of death and free
from grief and dark despair.
Why did he come? To heal our hearts.
He heals us still. Because he came
one holy night in Bethlehem
and grew in grace and walked the hills
of Galilee—the Word made flesh—
because he came and showed the face
of God—the world would never be
the same, and never shall again.

 

Ring the Christmas Bells

Ring the Christmas bells, ring in Emmanuel
today. A child is born in Bethlehem amid the
creatures in the stable. Humble his
surroundings, yet he comes to rule the hearts of
people ‘round the world. Are you afraid?
Give to the holy one your fears. And do you
weep? Give him your tears; he makes of them
your baptism. Return to purity, O children.
Come, oh, come to him.

Ring the Christmas bells, ring in the victory
of joy and peace. A child is born in Bethlehem,
and creatures give him homage. Kings adore
him; precious are the gifts they bring. Now sing
for him a lullaby; sing him to sleep. Sing this:
Sweet Jesus, God among us, Lord Emmanuel.
So innocent is he, yet he accepts our sin and
our distress. Return to bliss, O children.
Come, oh, come to him.

Ring the Christmas bells, ring in the hope of
better days to be. A child is born in Bethlehem,
a world transformed his gift to you and me.
He is the Morning Star; the very sun bows
down to him, and through his tender mercy
what was old and weary now is new again.
Give him your tears, and they become your
baptism. Return to innocence, O children.
Come, oh, come to him.

Prayer for a Wounded Heart

Sir Joshua Reynolds, Colonel Acland and Lord Sydney: The Archers, 1769

Archer, Hold Your Arrows Now

O God, make soft my wounded heart, which
wants to grow a dragon’s skin so it cannot be
pierced again, a coat of armor to deflect the
daggers and the arrows that with deadly aim
would make it bleed. But I need courage more
than shielding now, to keep my heart exposed…
to open and remodel it. I wish it to become a warm,
inviting heart, O God, one that is friendly, even
welcoming, for there are those it would embrace
and make for them a fragrant garden, sweet and
safe and scented with the rose, the lilac, and the
honeysuckle vine… a place above the grime of city
streets where visitors can climb to find security,
as squirrels sniff the air and scurry to their nests
before a storm. Here is my heart, my precious
ones, I cry to them. Here is protection; here is rest.
Now close your eyes and listen. You will find that
everything there is to know about reality is said
between the steady heartbeats and in whispers
at the pausing of the breath. And I would teach
them that to love is not a risk at all; it is an antidote
for death. Love speaks the language of the soul, of
sunlight, of the nightingale, the hum of summer in the
grass, the old oak groaning in the wind. If love is
stolen from an open heart, there is in heaven an
unlimited supply of it, and innocence as well.

My wounded heart, left to its own devices, would
have long since withered, gone to seed, all but
invisible among the weeds whose thorns make
inhospitable the space around. How could it heal,
this heart inflamed, when barely capable of
pounding blood through arteries and veins?
Created durable enough, it must have maintenance
just like the rest of us, with exercise and fresh air
and a diet rich in love. Admonishment to toughen
up is well regarded, and the heart is, after all, a
muscle not to be neglected, but its nourishment,
the best of it, is heaven-sent. No heart can thrive
on bread alone.

O God, make whole and clean my wounded heart
and sweep away the scales; it needs no armor from
now on. I call to the archer, Hold your arrows. I am
friend and no one’s enemy today. Almighty God,
endow me with endurance and vitality, for I would
serve thee and be happy, as my heart, by nature wise,
by thee restored to purity, advises me.

Amen.

Where God Sojourns

Sunrise, Cameron Highlands, Malaysia 

I Can Always Find That Place

It might have been a dream I prayed. It was a
good prayer and a good dream anyway. I gave
everything to God that day, with all my heart but
otherwise no sacrifice on my part—I had nothing
anyway. It was early—in the moment when the
muted indigo of morning first begins to break and
streaks of color emanate from where the sun waits,
as if to tease and tantalize the watchers eager for
the blazing red and gold and lavender. Sunrise is
never commonplace, each one unique and never
ceasing to surprise, like rainbows after summer
storms, though you’ve seen rainbows many times
before.

We stood for warmth around a fire, and each of us
threw dry sticks into the flames, giving them the
names of our afflictions. And the flames burned
higher as if they delighted in the fuel, as if their
favorite food were of the devil’s manufacture.
Angels came, reminding me of streams of starlings I
had seen at dusk, returning by the thousand from
the fields to where they nested in the isolated
stands of elm and chestnut east of town. We sang
then, lively hymns of praise and solemn chants, with
awe and reverence, and then the sky began to
change and for a moment so transparent it became
that we could see a hundred miles or more,
to forests fluttering with poplars, tips alight with yellow
morning… to the shore and to the islands in the
sea; and everything we looked upon was glorious,
more beautiful than anything a mortal had beheld—
until the fiery curve breached the horizon.

The sun moved quickly then, efficiently, a goodwife
washing trees and hillsides clean before it reached
our valley to immerse us in redemption as it had the
grass and leaves. A whirlwind, light and easy, stirred
the ashes, lifting up our cares and bearing them
away.

The next day, angels came to carry me to the
gathering at the dawn. They wrapped me in a
blanket like a robe, a fleece of creamy white. An
angel said his name—Abdullah, “servant of God” —
and lifted me above the snow and kept me warm
against the lingering night, but I could see below—
apple orchards, not yet heavy with their crop but
light and lacy with the promise of it; farms and
chapels, people rising early to their chores; rivers,
lakes, clear water lapping at the verges—such
unearthly loveliness, a hazy color wheel that slowly,
lazily came into focus, nothing hurrying, released
from time.

We came at last to highlands overlooking tidy fields
and greening vales where sheep were going out
to graze; and there, beside a waterfall, the others
waited to be healed and purified. And all was as it
had been yesterday except, upon that hill, what had
been new the day before was newer still today.

I never did confide a word of my experience
among the penitents and angels… the ashes of
our suffering and pain ascending to oblivion…
for I confess I feared they’d say that it was “just
a dream.” But who can know what streams of
love and peace might course throughout the
universe, and where, and when they might flow
by? Yet I have seen the world created, new and
luminous, and I can always find that place,
where it is always morning, early in the spring. I
only close my eyes and fly on angels’ wings to
Eden, where God sojourns peacefully at dawn.

Prayers for Life’s Unfolding

Botticelli, Three Miracles of St. Zenobius

TWO PRAYERS FOR THE SICK. 1. God, you made us in your image—perfect, whole, strong, and full of love and laughter—yet you invite us to depend on you in times of weakness, fear, disease… and we need only ask in order to be guided by your light, healed by your grace, and at all times sustained. And so our lives, health, strength, and confidence are in your hands, sustained by your unfailing love and ever-present power. Teach us, O God, to stand firmly in the stream of your love and receive the great unnumbered blessings that pour from you unabated. Thank you, Merciful Father and Mother, for being ever with us, in difficulty and in celebration.

Merciful God, lay your healing hand upon the sick among us. Send your Holy Spirit to their assistance. Dispatch your angels to wrap them in peace and serenity. Keep them free of fear and pain. Gather to their aid all excellent help of every kind—the health workers, medicines, treatments, techniques, and tender care that can give speedy relief to their distress. Gather also their family and friends, whose prayers, affection, laughter, and support will keep their spirits soaring. May every cell be made whole, restored to normal functioning and spreading renewed energy throughout their bodies. I pray with confidence for their souls’ healing, such that their health and vigor, strength and happiness will not only return but be shown more durable than ever. Some may wonder and say “Miraculous!”—but miracles are the way you speak to us, your word made manifest. Thus may you be glorified in the victory that even now proceeds from your right hand. Amen.

Giotto, The Wedding at Cana

2. God, you are great beyond our understanding, but this we know: You created us in your image, whole and sound in mind and body, loving, intelligent, lively, and creative. The Bible tells us that you looked at your creation and you did not say, “This is a mess.” You saw that it was very good indeed. Open our eyes, Merciful God, to your presence in our lives and your image in us. Guide our vision beyond our ailments—beyond diabetes, beyond hypertension, beyond high cholesterol, beyond excess weight and chronic anxiety, beyond all that is flawed—to your perfect image, beautiful, energetic, and holy. Send to our assistance the very best help–people, places, protocols, procedures, and prescriptions, according to your will–as aids to total healing. Instruct us in the ways of well-being. Teach us how to treat ourselves, dear God. Be our ultimate physician, so that, with the help of those you have assigned, we will enjoy radiant health, ascribed to your glory. Send your Holy Spirit to abide in us with a spirit of peace, tranquility, abundance, and generosity. May our relationships be harmonious and our homes shelters of serenity. Do not delay in our transformation, God. May we begin to know the joy of your salvation this very hour. Amen.

Prayer for Chattanooga

New York Daily News

Almighty God, there is great pain and perplexity in Tennessee and throughout our nation, as six children have died, dozens of others are injured, and a bus driver is charged with homicide and other crimes. God, we pray for the hurt and the bereaved in the aftermath of the November 21 crash in Chattanooga. Merciful Creator, may your Holy Spirit dwell with the grieving, so that sadness does not turn to hate or hopelessness. Instill in them the assurance that the children who died are at this very moment with you in eternal life and glory. Infuse the injured children with your almighty power. Heal their wounds and bathe their spirits in hope and comfort. Guide the medical personnel—doctors, nurses, therapists, technicians—so that their hands are healing hands, their minds are clear, and their hearts are wise. Unite the community in holy purpose of support and compassion. For those friends and family members who are angry, confused, or despairing, shine your light into their darkness, God, and make your presence known. Open their hearts to one another so that emotional wounds are not aggravated but rather treated tenderly and given mercy and sustenance. Send all assistance needed without delay, dear God. Summon those of us who can contribute in any way; and enter the heart of the bus driver, God—may it be a humble and contrite heart. Comfort and encourage his friends and family members who are in pain. May truth and wisdom prevail. Out of this tragedy, God, may wonders upon wonders be manifest and your name be glorified, and may peace be victorious and love shine more brightly than all the stars in all the galaxies. Amen.