Kirkepiscatoid

(Candlelight Vigil from Trinity Episcopal Church, Kirksville, MO to the Kirk Memorial Building of Truman State University, held on August 31, 2011 for the late Marcellus Andrews, 19, who died Aug. 24 in Waterloo, IA from a beating sustained August 19. Witnesses heard his assailants hurl several anti-gay epithets as they beat him and kicked him in the face. Photo by Julie Seidler.)

Below are the two litanies used in the August 31 candlelight vigil:

A Litany for those who have suffered violence as a result of bullying and hatred
by Maria L. Evans

O God of justice and mercy, we pray that no more daughters and sons in this world die as the result of being bullied simply because of who they are; be it race, religion, sexual orientation, or social awkwardness. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray that each of us can begin to scrub the seemingly innocuous roots of the language of hatred from our vocabularies, and for the courage to resist being silently complicit when we hear others using this language. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray that our children can grow up in environments that teach them to transform their personal failures and disappointments into healing lessons of life, rather than desire scapegoats to atone for their inadequacies. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray that parents can put aside what they were sometimes taught, in order to promote tolerance and diversity at home. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray that our communities grow into places that respect and nurture the dignity of every human being, and to constantly seek ways to bind our perceived differences. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray particularly for the vision of a generation of people who can grow up feeling self-empowered and truly loved simply as themselves, free from beatings and psychological abuse at the hands of those whose own lack of self-esteem drives them to hatred—a failed attempt to assuage their own pain. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

O Lord, you understand this above all others, for your only Son lay scourged and beaten among jeering, mocking crowds on the dusty road to Golgotha, just as Marcellus Andrews was scorned and savagely beaten, left for dead on a dark, dirty Waterloo curbside. Be our light in the darkness, Lord; protect our young people and fill them with the love of your Holy Spirit; hold them in your Son’s loving arms in their most fearful hours, and be with them always.
Amen.

_______________________________

A Prayer for Communities
by Cole Woodcox

In peace let us pray.

Lord, who cradled the broken and wounded body of your Son, you are the source of our love.

Lord, who governs the vast reaches of the universe and the innermost recesses of our hearts, you knit us into communities of gratitude for the lives we share with each other.

We commend to your mercy your gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered children who have died in the past few weeks -- those whose names we know, especially Marcellus Andrews, and those whose names we do not. We pray that they, their families and their friends may know comfort and share in your peace.
Risen Lord,
We remember them.

We ask a blessing on your gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered children who are taught by some to despise their whole lives, who are bullied into living numb, who are injured by hate, who are told their hopes are worth nothing. May you surround them, uphold them and pilot them out of cruelty and violence, out of pain and fear.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.

We pray that, like Ruth and Naomi, we too may observe how we live between boundaries, that we rethink categories, that we are authentic to ourselves and that we come to live in love.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.

We pray that, like Mary Magdalene, Peter and the early Christians, we too may understand the liberating power of differences, that we welcome the whole and not just those parts that please us, that we dance in the cosmos and not just in the comfortable space of our own beliefs and that we nurture the place where peace and justice greet and embrace.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.

We pray that, like your saints, we too may see how every form of life fills the measure of its creation and has joy therein, that we show reverence toward ourselves and toward each other and that we show this in our creativity, our morality, our choices, our heart dreams.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.

We pray that, like Joseph, those who are reviled, abused and beaten might resist fear and convert it to justice, that we hunger and thirst for compassion and that we find ways to help our town, our state, our nation make new connections between dignity and social responsibility.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.

Gracious God, help us untie knots of hate in our schools and help us make visible in our communities your delight in all creation -- though we are many, we are one body because each living thing is touched by your divine light.
Amen.