Heartbroken God,
Today, many of us will break from routine
and its responsibilities.
We’ll fire up barbeques and lawn mowers.
We’ll hike the cool woods
or swing lazily in hammocks.
We’ll splash about in swimming pools
or lakes,
or rivers,
or oceans.
We will not intend it,
but by effect, much of our play
on Memorial Day
will be
to forget.
Help us to remember, O God.
And help us to remember
with the heart and mind of your
Christ,
the Prince of
Peace.
Help us to remember
that you did not create human
beings
to perform or behold
the brutalities of
war.
Yet, for countless years,
across the globe,
our proud denials have reduced
your holy names to
battle cries,
your cross to
flagpoles,
your church to
Caesars’ outposts,
and your beloved
children to
(Dear God, forgive us)
renewable,
expendable,
resources.
Help us to remember
those who have,
by requirement or resolve,
been thrown into
realities unimaginable
to the rest of us.
Help us to remember all of
the husbands,
the fathers,
the wives,
the mothers,
the daughters,
the sons,
the sisters,
the brothers,
the grandparents,
the grandchildren,
the aunts,
the uncles,
the friends,
the enemies…
All
who have perished
physically
spiritually
emotionally
(and
all of the above)
in war,
the near-perfect
affront
to Perfect Love.
Help all humankind to remember
those who’ve died
and killed,
so that in remembering we begin to
die
to our despair and
fears,
such staunch veracities,
even here,
in
the midst of your Creation
your magnificent
Self-Disclosure.
Help us to remember,
and to heal those come home broken.
Help us to remember,
and to comfort those whose apple’s
eyes
do not come home
at all.
Help us, God.
Help us to remember
with lives of fearless
peace.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Amen.
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