2023-05-31 A Prayer: Picking Up the Slack

O Lord, somewhere our efforts end and others take up the slack. Help all in authority, in decision-making, even as we the recipients and beneficiaries of what trickles down, do put on the garments of service and hearken to changing tides of world affairs; see us with a vast panoply of experience, alternately brave and then penitent, or courageous and then nervous. So grant us willingness to work together and to find ourselves without haste nor fear of degradations; see us glad as fellow servants and aides in the camp.

So grant purposeful, fighting spirit, help in acknowledging what differences of lifestyle and custom do exist “out there”; in simple ways, let us be fellow travelers over and against sinful behavior, yet also eager to sign our names to that writ called “Forgiveness”. Each of us can discover some playing field of penance. Each of us can discover some joy at being forgiven for our prodigality. Each of us can lighten our personal load by being blindly, foolishly even, compassionate and tuned in to the regrets harbored in someone’s heart near to us. So help us to put on those fatigues and hospital attire, those uniforms and regular signs of participation; help us to fit in, even as we carry a bold, oddly-shaped hope and personal duty unto what we have received.

We pray all this in Your Name, Amen.