We confess a desire to feel Your Presence and a need to embrace Your love for us. Thank you for the gifts of life and spiritual direction, for healing love. Thank you for grace that transforms and empowers people to love and serve.

We have gathered this morning as part of a society divided in the means to achieve a purpose that most of us share: to be servants of justice and enablers of true peace in this world. Help the leaders of nations be open to Your presence. Help them find the courage to re-evaluate and reconsider entrenched positions that prolong injustice. Help us find wisdom to end needless suffering. Lead us to the path of true peace and help each of us find the courage to seek Your peace in our inner lives, in our significant relationships, in our daily living, and through the systems of our government. Let us not be content with simplistic answers, but rededicate our entire arsenal of heart, mind, will, and strength to make peace within and between each other. In the name and the spirit of Jesus. Amen.