Piloting Faith: We pray for children...

A Word for the Day...
Last night we hosted our monthly book club gathering in our home. We have gathered together for almost seven years with a continually evolving, wonderful group of women who are so smart and funny and kind. We are fortunate to "do life" together.
One of the women in the group is an assistant principal at a local school. She talked about the challenges she faces working with students who need special education. Our conversation quickly turned to the challenges all of our families are facing in this age of rapid change and unyielding stress.
As they talked, I remembered a poem by Ina Hughs, called "We Pray 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 new sneakers,
Who never "counted potatoes,"
Who are born in places we wouldn't be caught dead in,
Who never go to the circus,
Who live in an X-rated world.
We pray for children
Who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
Who sleep with the cat and bury goldfish,
Who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money,
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 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,
Who get visits from the tooth fairy,
Who don't like to be kissed in front of the car pool,
Who squirm in church and scream on 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 are never spoiled by anyone,
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 never get a second chance,
For those we smother.
And for those who will grab the hand of anybody kind
enough to offer it.
We pray for children. Amen.
And so we do. Thank you to those of you who work with our children - teachers, therapists, coaches, mentors. You make such a huge difference. We will pray for our children this week and every week, and also those who invest in them.
- Rev. Cameron Trimble, author of Piloting Church: Helping Your Congregation Take Flight

Prayer for the Week
God,
Keep my anger from becoming meanness.
Keep my sorrow from collapsing into self-pity.
Keep my heart soft enough to keep breaking.
Keep my anger turned towards justice, not cruelty.
Remind me that all of this, every bit of it, is for love.
Keep me fiercely kind.
Amen.