For Paris, and for All of Us | A Prayer

Oh God, our God.

How do we begin? Before we even part our lips, we draw back. We want to gather ourselves up, tuck our knees to our chins, and hope that it’s all a bad dream.

Dread is all around us. And not just today, and not just on Friday. But always and in all ways.

We note well how those who bear the name “Terror”

have marked our hearts with the same.

We grieve for a nation, a people, a city, whose eyes will not rest

who cannot shake the scenes violence from their heads.

We toss and turn at night, knowing that refugees are doing the same in a boat somewhere, off some coast, and we pray that they will reach the shore.

And in the midst of it all, we turn our faces to You and ask that You breathe the life of faith into us again. Because we cannot see how You could have been present, we have not the belief that You could have been there.

Would you tenderly awaken us with the painful and mysterious reminder of Your presence.

And teach us, to bear Your incarnate way here on earth,

until all opens up into eternity, and we see Your kingdom come.