OUR PRAYER FOR OUR CHILDREN and OUR GREATEST FEAR

Considering all that is going on in Henrico County Public Schools and districts like it, we are compelled to pray for the lives and well being of our children, that God will watch over and protect them in settings where they are neither valued, nor viewed as gifts from God.  These children have been moved outside “the village” that has been charged to raise them, and are left behind further and further every day due to the evils of politics, selfishness, racism, sexism, and classism.

IF YOU TOO ARE NOT OUTRAGED ABOUT THE ABUSE AND NEGLECT OF CHILDREN, THEN YOU ARE EITHER DEAD, THE DEVIL, OR NOT PAYING ATTENTION!

 

A Prayer Of Responsibility For Children

  We pray for children

Who put chocolate fingers everywhere, Who like to be tickled, Who stomp in puddles and ruin their new pants, Who sneak Popsicles before supper, Who erase holes in math workbooks, Who can never find their shoes.

  And We pray for those

Who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire, Who can’t bound down the street in a new pair of sneakers, Who never “counted potatoes,” Who are born in places we wouldn’t be caught dead, Who never go to the circus, Who live in a X-rated world.

  We pray for children

Who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions, Who sleep with the dog and bury goldfish, Who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money, Who cover themselves with Band-aids and sing off key, Who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink, Who slurp their soup.

  And We pray for those

Who never get dessert, Who have no safe blanket to drag behind them, Who watch their parents watch them die, Who can’t find any bread to steal, Who don’t have any rooms to clean up, Whose pictures aren’t on anybody’s dresser, Whose monsters are real.

  We pray for children

Who spend all their allowance before Tuesday, Who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their food, Who like ghost stories, Who shove dirty clothes under the bed and never rinse out the tub, Who get visits from the tooth fairy, Who don’t like to be kissed in front of the carpool, Who squirm in church or temple and scream in the phone, Whose tears we sometimes laugh at and whose smiles can make us cry.

  And We pray for those

Whose nightmares come in the daytime, Who will eat anything, Who have never seen a dentist, Who aren’t spoiled by anybody, Who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep, Who live and move, but have no being.

  We pray for children

Who want to be carried and for those who must, For those we never give up on  And for those who don’t get a second chance. For those we smoother… And for those  who will grab the hand of anybody kind enough to offer it.

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Our Greatest Fear

Marianne Williamson from her book “A Return to Love”

 

Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate,
but that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, handsome, talented and fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us.
It is not just in some; it is in everyone.

And, as we let our own light shine, we consciously give
other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.