I wrote this about praying for justice Sunday morning. Still a good read. But today is Moral Monday in Memphis You might want to jump right to the. prayer inspired by John Lewis. Here it is.
Now back to the brief blog:
Plague and contagion are a recurrent part of human life at every scale. During the last plague—COVID-19– the humans were more or less on the same side. At least they were until some saw political profit to be made in disabling the social body so that we lost our mind. COVID-19 killed somewhere north of 6 million people and it’s not over: 1,001 died yesterday. It dropped me to my knees. The current political plague seems harder in which to pray, oddly, although there is no shortage of loud religiosity. Nobody with any actual Spirit wants any of that, but we risk the wellspring of hope, resilience and kindness by not praying at all.
During COVID-19 I wrote a book of prayers, Prayers for a Newer New Awakening inspired by people like us a hundred years ago. They, too, were struggling with a society gone mad with unaccountable corporations, intentionally ignorant politicians and a church split between those who wanted the simplicities of an imagined past and those who leaned into the modern social implications of the Gospel.
The social gospel folks got so much wrong. They were naïve, just as we have been. They managed to overlook the dynamics of gender and race! And they were annoying with their righteousness (easy pickings for the Right). But still, much of the social infrastructure of America was created in the early 1900s by people blending the Spirit with the gifts of health technology and exploding science. They built hundreds of hospitals, public health departments in every county and a vast array of social service organizations. They created the politics that enabled serious government policy. Altogether they advanced life expectancy by decades. It is what Jimmy Carter once called the “mundane revolution” and it succeeded until now, of course.
My point is not the politics, but where politics come from. That is, the Spirit that tried to bring some of the promises of God into reality as justice, mercy, kindness and generosity. They prayed and did their best. We should, too—pray, that is.
So, the small book of prayers I wrote in COVID-19 may be even more relevant now.
The point is not to read my prayers, but maybe to kindle your own. And to do so with people who share the hope of a new awakening.
Every couple of days, I’ll point to a video. Here’s an interview about the prayers that Walt and Elliott Peterson did back then about praying in times like this.
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The book is available on Amazon, of course. All the money goes to Partners for Better Health, which is home to the Leading Causes of Life Initiative and Hold.Health
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