We pause to pray, to meditate, to to relax and even drift off. Entering a spirit of contemplation, we intend upon others an abundance of good things.  For health, happiness, humor, intimate connections, emerging love, trust, compassion and fairness we wish upon our fellow journey-mates and indeed the world.  In these moments may our anger, fears, egos, selfishness, insecurities and harried-ness diminish in this season of selflessness and simplicity.  May we realize the dawn and birth of love and hope in all our interactions and circumstances.  We meditate upon and commit to realizing a beautiful balance between exhausting consumerism, hectic days familiar songs and children at risk – and prioritizing our lives according to the ways of justice, peace and generosity.

In our prayers, our world is changed. We see people differently when we intend upon them what we wish for ourselves. We are changed as we pray and intend for people – when we look upon them with all their faults and foibles and still declare them wonderful; we are changed when we pray our food as we abide in gratitude, as we pray our children and grandchildren while playing or doing homework or making lunches.  Our prayers are the hopes and desires for each other – and why would we desire anything but well-being and beautiful possibilities for each other rather than alienation, pain and calamity?  May our thoughts, prayers and intentions lead to life-giving words.  May these words, in turn, lead to actions that create, build bridges, heal and help.  May the actions and gestures and affections then become habits that build trust and security – that ground and free. 

As we abide in a community on the way, we affirm life in the midst of death, endings, discouragement and sadness.  We remember those rebuilding trust and hope; those countless families and persons living with uncertainty, upheaval; those grieving over loved ones dying; those deeply questioning the nature and meaning of their lives and relationships.  Those battling cancer and those caring for those with illnesses.  How are we neighbors to such as these?  How do we abide in solidarity?  How are we moved?  What can we do, be and learn with our fellow travelers?  We would be one – together experiencing the joys and dramas. And in so doing co-create peace and welfare in this city for the benefit of all. 

We celebrate the advent of new awareness, new questions, new commitments, new possibilities.  We invite new mindfulness of what is essential in this age of superficiality.  And, we would commit again this day to dance, as though no one is watching, to love as though we have never been hurt before, to sing as though no one can hear us and to live as though heaven in on earth. 

We declare our freedom from fears and misunderstandings, from limited perspectives; we pray for the transformation of our egos, our relationships, our communities; we celebrate the birth of a peasant child who would embody all that was understood as godly and christlike – a guide still for us who would walk the ways of unconditional love and revolutionary justice.  Amen.

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