Many moons ago, the parish I attended organized a Lenten ecumenical series with weekly reflections on various approaches to praying. One session focused on “Praying with the News”.
Last week, as I was skimming the Saturday paper, memories of that long ago session came back to me. The focus was the importance of praying for all those affected by global disasters and those struggling with world and local events recorded in the news. Part of the week’s session included prayers of intercession for all the problems arising at that time. But what of now? Such prayers are still vital for the world. They are part of our human and faith commitment, entrusting the unfolding of the world to God, sending out care, hope and love in these, our, days.
Now, as we continue to greet a new year, the world is facing extraordinary times of uncertainty, and for many, days of anxiety and fear, continuing war, violence, impoverishment and environmental degradation. Like each of you, I suspect, I/we are hearing voices from family, friends and colleagues who are feeling overwhelmed to the point of “giving up” on the news. Many express feelings of being entrapped by darkness or despair; paralyzed to respond.
So what then of “praying with the news?” Reading the paper I found myself wondering if even our praying in such a way engulfs us more deeply in a negative narrative in which hope seems imperceptible.
Then I woke up to the fact that this wasn’t the sum total of my reading. I was also reading stories of care, concern, kindness and service, sometimes “sacrificial” service. I read of the wonderfully “giving-life” of President Jimmy Carter. I read of people opening their homes to those left homeless by the LA fires, of the Pennsylvania Amish community gathered to build small homes in the aftermath of the devastating storms in North Carolina. I was encouraged by a story of people in the U.S. donating to Canadian leadership in refugee service and resettlement, by entrepreneurs bringing creativity to and investment in providing light for children in Africa, allowing them to study at night, and I was touched by accounts of numerous small acts of kindness toward neighbours and for environmental healing.
Immersed in such stories I was lifted beyond feelings of helplessness. Perhaps praying with the news is also then about praying in gratitude for such inspired goodness, for the people involved, for the beauty and gifting of creation, opening us to a more balanced perspective as we look at the world. Engaging prayerfully in such stories is a reminder of hope and promise. Positive news of this kind inspires each of us to commit to “the more”. It helps unbind us from the entrapment of fear, anxiety, despair and inaction. It calls us to place goodness at the heart of our lives and in the world. As American journalist, Hunter Thompson wrote:
“Good news is rare in these days, and every glittering ounce of it should be cherished and hoarded and worshipped and fondled like a priceless diamond.”
In praying with today’s good news we are invited to place life-enhancing energy in the world without a need to know what its gift and impact may be. In placing positive energy in the world we become expanders of that energy, carriers of hope, beacons of promise and possibility, people who can truly “real-ize” a life beyond perceived impasse. Carmelite nun, Sister Constance Fitzgerald says: “It is only in the process of bringing impasse to prayer, to the perspective of the God who loves us, that our society will be freed, healed, changed, brought to paradoxical new visions, and freed for nonviolent, selfless, liberating action, freed, therefore, for community on this planet earth.” So let’s pray with the good news, let it transfigure our lives for personal peace and free us for good.
-Sister Mary Rowell, CSJ
Image: Philipp Düsel @philipp_dice | Unsplash
