This Evening's Prayer

“In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.” ― Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

My heart is solemn.

My thoughts run around trying to make sense of hate.

Of violence.

Of noise,

Of chaos,

Of disdain.

I wonder how and why people's mouths grow such a distaste for certain members of humanity.
A humanity that we all share.

A humanity of which we all belong
and have a membership.
A humanity that unites and does not divide.
If we are all made by the same creator,
then why do we feel the need and the place for hate?

Are our differences really so distinct that they require death to equal out a wrong?
A wrong established in our creation?
Do we really give the Fall so much credit for our hatred that we don't recognize it as the reason that we have a Savior?

Perhaps I'm wrong.
Perhaps my own biases of perceived hatred are really perceiving fear.
Devotion.
Mistaken loyalty.

Lord, have mercy on us all.
Deliver those who are captured.
Heal those who are harmed.
Grieve with the grieving.
Respond with the responders.
Have grace and redemption for those who are in need of such things.

Forgive us in our wrongs and our hatred.
Unite us in our humanity.

Kyrie Eleison.  Lord, have mercy.