Pastor's Corner

We Pray for Children

08-29-2021Pastor's CornerRev. Robert J. Deehan, V.F.

In this summertime, as we spend extra time with family and friends – especially the young ones, I offer this invitation to pray for children.

We Pray for Children

By Ina J. Hughes

We pray for children 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 a new pair of sneakers,
who never “counted potatoes,”
who are born in places where
we wouldn’t be caught dead,
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 watch their parents watch them die,
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,
and never rinse out the tub,
who get visits from the tooth fairy,
who don’t like to be kissed in front of the carpool,
who squirm in church or temple
and scream in 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 aren’t spoiled by anybody,
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 don’t 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.

(from We Pray for Children, 1995, William Morrow publishers)

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