[Note: As it appears that PastorDan is taking another week off from his Virtual Pulpit, I’m taking it upon myself to fill in again for the weekly prayer/meditation session…]
Blessings and peace to all of you in the name of [insert deity here].
Peace…
What is it?
Where is it?
Whether it be in the deserts of Iraq, the transit stations of Britain, the mean streets of the urban jungle, the virtual thoroughfares of the blogosphere, or in the quiet desperation of our daily lives, peace seems greatly needed…and very distant at times.
I’ve found a series of prayers for peace from varied traditions:
O Great Spirit of our Ancestors… Give us the wisdom to teach our children to love, to respect, and to be kind to each other so that they may grow with peace in mind.
Let us learn to share all the good things that you provide for us on this Earth.
In the name of Allah, the beneficent, the merciful.
Praise be to the Lord of the Universe who has created
us and made us into tribes and nations that we may know each other, not that we may despise each other.
Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, that we
may walk the paths of the Most High.
And we shall beat
our swords into plowshares, and our spears into pruning
hooks.
Nation shall not lift up sword against nation.
Neither shall they learn war anymore.
And none shall be afraid.
May all beings everywhere plagued with sufferings
of body and mind quickly be freed from their illness.
May those frightened cease to be afraid, and may those
bound be free.
May the powerless find power, and
may people think of befriending one another.
O God, lead us from the unreal to the Real.
O God, lead us from darkness to light.
O God, lead us from death to immortality.
Shanti, Shanti, Shanti unto all.
Be generous in prosperity, and thankful in adversity…
be a lamp unto those who walk in darkness and a home to the stranger.
Be eyes to the blind, and a guiding light unto the feet of the erring.
Be a breath of life to the body of humankind, a dew to the soil of the human heart, and a fruit upon the tree of humility.
For the Human Family
O God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us through Jesus your Son:
Look with compassion on the whole human family;
take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts;
break down the walls that separate us;
unite us in bonds of love;
and work through our struggle and confusion to accomplish your purposes on earth;
that, in your good time, all nations and races may serve you in harmony around your heavenly throne; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
In the quiet of your hearts, please add your own prayers for peace or other petitions; if you wish, please share them with the community in the space below.
Namaste
Resources for tonight’s diary:
For the first six prayers: Beliefnet.com
For the last prayer: The Episcopal Book of Common Prayer (prayer actually found on the ELCA website)
Photo from La Paz Waterfall Gardens, Varablanca, Costa Rica.
What a beautiful diary, and so soothing.
Thank you, Cali Scribe, for the beautiful prayers.
Om shanti shanti shanti
Amen
Grandfather,
Look at our brokenness.
We know that in all creation
Only the human family
Has strayed from the Sacred Way.
We know that we are the ones
Who are divided
And we are the ones
Who must come back together
To walk in the Sacred Way.
Grandfather,
Sacred One,
Teach us love, compassion, and honor
That we may heal the earth
And heal each other.
— Ojibway prayer
This is a beautiful diary. I don’t have a prayer, but a quotation:
Peace is not the absence of war; it is a virtue; a state of mind; a disposition for benevolence; confidence; and justice.
– Spinoza
Here’s another one:
Anything may be accidentally the cause of joy, sorrow, or desire.
–Spinoza
I haven’t come across that before. It’s a very powerful idea.
It’s from Ethics, in the section On the Origin and Nature of the Emotions, Proposition XV.
Prayer for Peace
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
(St. Francis of Assisi, 1181-1226)
of my mood that I totally forgot about that one.
Thanks for the refresher, Brother… 🙂
Though it hasn’t yet got the little birdies to sit on my finger. 😉
Of peace, too, of course, but that’s never been my primary focus when thinking about this from Francis.
This one is more about inner peace:
Listen to the words of the Great Mother,
Know the Mystery,
that if that which thou seekest
thou findest not within thee,
thou will never find it without thee…
For behold
I Have Been With Thee From The Beginning.
And I await thee now.
Blessed Be.
may be more important than world peace — because if people don’t have peace within themselves, they’ll never know how to bring it about in the world.
Thanks for sharing…
You can feel it when you go to their mesas. It envelops you. Here is a Hopi prayer for peace.
A Hopi Prayer for Peace
“Great Spirit and all unseen, this day we pray and ask you for guidance, humbly we ask you to help us and fellow men to have recourse to peaceful ways of life, because we ask You to help us and fellow men to have recourse to peaceful ways of life, because of uncontrolled deceitfulness by humankind. Help us all to love, not hate one another.
We ask you to be seen in an image of Love and Peace. Let us be seen in beauty, the colors of the rainbows.
We respect our Mother, the planet & our corn fields, with our loving care, from Her breast we receive our nourishment.
Let us not listen to the voices of the two-hearted, the destroyers of mind, the haters of self-made leaders, whose lusts for power and wealth will lead us into confusion and darkness. Seek visions always of world beauty, not violence not battlefields.
It is our duty to pray always for harmony between man and earth, so that the earth will bloom once more. Let us show our emblem of love and goodwill for all life and land.
Pray for the House of Glass, (United Nations) Pray for within it are minds clear and pure as ice and mountain streams.
Pray for the great leaders of nations in the House of Mica who in their own quiet ways help the earth in balance.
We pray the Great Spirit that one day our Mother Earth will be purified into a healthy peaceful one.
Let us Sing for strength of wisdom with all nations for the good of all people. Our hope is not yet lost, purification must be to restore the health of our Mother Earth for lasting peace and happiness, Techqua Ikachi —- for Land and Life!
“Together with all Nations we Hold this World in Balance”
Hopi elders
Hotevilla USA
Not exactly a prayer for peace – but one that brings me peace when I’m struggling with frustration – so as noted above – offered as a source of inner peace – which is a prerequisite.
A prayer by Archbishop Romero, given shortly before his assassination
– – –
It helps, now and then, to step back and take the long view. The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is beyond our vision. * We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work. Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us. * No statement says all that could be said. No prayer fully expresses our faith. No confession brings perfection. No pastoral visit brings wholeness. No program accomplishes the church’s mission. No set of goals and objectives includes everything. * This is what we are about: We plant seeds that one day will grow. We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. We lay foundations that will need further development. We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities. * We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, and opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest. * We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own. * Amen *
– Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero
Thank you for this. A voice, and a name, far too often overlooked.
Prayer to the Spirit of Six Directions
Leader: We turn to the West for a blessing to the Spirit of Shalom, Peace: make us whole, make us holy, help us to love You and one another with our whole heart, our whole mind, our whole being, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: We turn to the North for a blessing to the Spirit of Integrity: give us Your strength and the courage to endure all the problems we may face, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: We turn to the East for a blessing, to the Spirit of Illumination: open our eyes to the sacredness of every living thing, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: We turn to the South for a blessing, to the Spirit of Transformation: help us to grow in wisdom and grace and the goodness of the ages, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: We look to the Heavens, to the Spirit of Openness: fill us with a breadth of vision to see that Your love embraces all, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: We touch the Earth for a blessing, and thereby touch the Spirit which lives among us and within us: help us to be more human and to praise you through the work of our hands, we pray:
People: Empower us, Holy Spirit.
Leader: Let us go from here blessed and renewed in the Spirit of Peace, in the Spirit of Integrity, in the Spirit of Illumination, in the Spirit of Transformation, with hopes lifted high to the heavens and with hearts loving the earth in the name of our loving, creating, nurturing God.
People: Amen!
Source: Earthministry.org – Caring for all Creation
And a vision of peace from the book of Micah. Most of this text is better known from Isaiah, but there are some key differences that Jim Wallis highlights. I find I agree with his interpretation. Some comments at the bottom.
1 In the last days
the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established
as chief among the mountains;
it will be raised above the hills,
and peoples will stream to it.
2 Many nations will come and say,
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD,
to the house of the God of Jacob.
He will teach us his ways,
so that we may walk in his paths.”
The law will go out from Zion,
the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
3 He will judge between many peoples
and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide.
They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation,
nor will they train for war anymore.
4 Every man will sit under his own vine
and under his own fig tree,
and no one will make them afraid,
for the LORD Almighty has spoken.
5 All the nations may walk
in the name of their gods;
we will walk in the name of the LORD
our God for ever and ever.
I’m convinced that peace is another name for justice. May all find their own “vine and fig tree” may no one need be afraid. We must find – and use – alternatives to war to stop (and punish) those who would harm us. War may even be justified – but it doesn’t work – it only breeds more hatred and fear.
I also find it significant in this passage from Micah – that all the nations may walk in the name of their gods
Might we set aside our theological disagreements – not ignore them – but set them aside – trust God to sort it out.
I claim as my path the Christian path – but one of the most life changing encounters with Truth I’ve ever had is from a translated version of the Qu’ran.
Sura 5:48 says “If Allah had wished, He could have made us all one congregation. As a test, He chose not to, instead we are to compete with one another in good works. In the end, all will return to Allah, and then that on which we disagree will be made plain.”
Namaste.
“My” God is not better, bigger, or more true than your God – God, the Creator and Ground of all Being – is greater than either of our comprehension – to persecute one another for our differences is to commit the worst form of idolotry.
I think most of us remember this simple song and can feel the meaning of the words. . .
ET THERE BE PEACE ON EARTH
Let there be peace on earth,
and let it begin with me.
Let there be peace on Earth,
the peace that was meant to be.
With God as our Father,
brothers all are we,
Let me walk with my brother,
in perfect harmony.
Let peace begin with me,
let this be the moment now.
With every step I take,
let this be my solemn vow,
To take each moment and live each moment
in peace, eternally.
Let there be Peace on Earth,
and let it begin with me.
Words and Music by Jill Jackson and Sy Miller, Circa 1955
A Native American Prayer
Let us know peace.
For as long as the moon shall rise,
For as long as the rivers shall flow,
For as long as the sun will shine,
For as long as the grass shall grow,
Let us know peace.
A Cheyenne Indian prayer