March 13 just about all of life in Chicagoland came to a screeching halt. I was looking forward to pondering prayer and theopoetics in community at the Arts, Religion, and Contemporary Culture conference on March 20, but that was canceled, along with everything else.
Prayer will take a new shape now, mid-pandemic. The governor of Illinois, where I live, just said our shelter-in-place order would hold until April 30 at the earliest. What is prayer now without the intimacy of a community of prayer? What connection with the divine might be possible as we pray in such earth-shattering, life-upending times?
Here are two prayers I prayed at church, these last two weeks:
Sunday, March 23
Bend near us, O God, though we cannot bend near one another.
Bend near and hear our prayer.
For we need you, O God.
We need your deep and wide love,
your peace beyond peace,
your tenderness that runs strong within us.
We need your ancient voice amid the daily mess of unfolding news.
We need your presence in these urgent days with no visible way or end in sight.
We long for crowd and concert,
convention and cafeteria,
company and congregation.
Hold our longing, and change us.
From within this cocoon of isolation,
let emerge a new way of life,
more in tune with justice and joy, mercy and kindness.
We pray for those who are deep in the heart of this virus today:
For those hot with fever,
help them pull round.
For those coughing and fighting for air,
heal them, O God.
For those of us well-schooled in sorrow,
hold today’s grief.
For hospitals at the center of critical care,
bless them with strength and courage and wisdom.
For scientists traveling through the dark
in search of a vaccine,
a treatment,
a way out,
bless them with a way toward healing and hope.
For the economic impact of pandemic:
for those who are not able to work and for those now overworked,
for those shutting down and those on the frontlines of crisis,
for industries where there is unprecedented demand,
and those in the gig economy whose work relies on the social fabric of gathered community - we lift up our prayer, O Christ.
As we reshuffle all aspects of life, O Spirit, be with the most vulnerable, the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the homeless.
Hold all the prayers of our heart, O Holy One, under the canopy of your love, in faith and in silence. And hear us as we pray together the prayer Jesus teaches us, saying Our Father...
March 15, 2020
We bend toward you in gratitude, O God.
For all that is ordinary about this day
- sunrise, daylight, a new start - we give you thanks.
How quickly we remember how astonishing this life is:
the smallest of spring flowers suddenly pushing up through the dirt,
the phone call to a friend half-way across the globe,
the rhythm of our own breath in and out, soft and slow.
Let us be astonished again, O God.
Let us feel that deep connection to you and to one another.
Give us over to your resonant joy and peace.
For we need you now, O Christ, we, your ancient church,
gathered across the village,
the district, the nation, the globe.
We are at once anxious and isolated,
stuck and inconvenienced,
slowed and separated,
nervous and shut down,
frustrated and fragile.
We know life will not stay this way forever, yet the hollow hush of stadiums and theaters make holy what is at stake.
For the most vulnerable, O God:
those in migrant camps,
in prisons,
in shelters,
in homes that are unsafe.
Lord, hear our prayer.
For those who have no place to go.
For those whose jobs place them in harm’s way.
For doctors and nurses, janitors and public servants.
Lord hear our prayer.
For those whose economic stability was already compromised,
and for the health of our global markets that impact us all.
Lord hear our prayer.
For those unable to come home and those forced to go home.
Lord hear our prayer.
For our loved ones already infected or in quarantine.
Lord hear our prayer.
For our children and teenagers whose routines have been unsettled by cancelation and change.
For young children who do not know, yet still sense the gravity and tenderness of what is ahead. Lord hear our prayer.
Send your spirit among us.
Give us your gospel of love.
Let love of neighbor be creative and courageous
in this long anxious time of waiting.
Give us new ways of doing justice in the midst of what is broken.
Let your loving kindness unfold slow and strong between us,
and show us mercy, O God of love.
We hand over to you now the ache in our belly,
the worry in our heart,
our fears,
our hopes,
our dreams,
in the prayers we lift up to you in silence.
(silence)
And now hear us as we pray: Our Father...