“Dear Lord, 
 be good to me...
 The sea is so wide 
 and my boat is so small.”

  Irish Fisherman's Prayer

O God, I thank You for this day of life
for eyes to see the sky
for ears to hear the birds
for feet to walk amidst the trees
for hands to pick the flowers from the earth
for a sense of smell to breathe in the sweet 
   perfumes of nature
for a mind to think about and appreciate 
   the magic of everyday miracles
for a spirit to swell in joy at Your mighty presence
   everywhere.

Marian Wright Edelman
Founder of the Children's Defense Fund
Author of The Measure Of Our Success

The little plans I tried to carry
Have failed
O' Dear God.
But, I will not sorrow
I will pause a little while
And try again tomorrow.
    
Anushree Karnani

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half truths, superficial relationships, so that you will live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression and exploitation of people so that you will work for justice, equality and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation and war, so that you will reach out your hand to comfort them and change their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with the foolishness to think that you can make a difference in the world, so that you will do the things which others tell you cannot be done.

Author Unknown

Lord, I don't ask for a faith
that would move yonder mountain.
I can take enough dynamite and move
it if it needs movin'.  I pray, Lord, 
for enough faith to move me.

Norman Allen 

So I'll sit here now and I'll pray to You
('though I can't really say why), 
as the walls collapse around me
and my loved ones suffer and die, 

and my health gives way and bills pile up
and time slips too quickly past, 
as I count all the joys life's denied me, 
and those that didn't last. 

I'll offer You thanks, my Creator, 
for the gifts You've yet to repeal; 
for walking and vision and laughter, 
for music, and dreams that seem real, 

for people who love me and seasons that change, 
for my body's own memories of love, 
and I'll sit here and pray in the darkness, 
for all the good it does. 

© Veronica A. Shoffstall
     Writer and Poet
     Veronica's Website 

Hold on to what is good,
even if it's a handful of earth. 
Hold on to what you believe,
Even if it's a tree that stands by itself. 
Hold on to what you must do, 
Even if it's a long way from here. 
Hold on to your life, 
Even if it's easier to let go. 
Hold on to my hand, 
Even if I've gone away from you.

Pueblo Indian Prayer

“Sometimes I go about pitying myself
 And all the while 
  I am being carried across the sky
 By beautiful clouds.”

 Ojibway Indian Expression

Oh, Lord, I thank you for the privilege and gift 
of living in a world filled with beauty and excitement 
and variety. 

I thank you for the gift of loving and being loved, 
for the friendliness and understanding and beauty 
of the animals on the farm and in the forest and marshes,  for the green of the trees, the sound of the waterfall,  the darting beauty of the trout in the brook. 

I thank you for the delights of music and children, 
of other people's thoughts and conversation 
and their books to read by the fireside or 
in bed with the rain falling on the roof 
or the snow blowing past outside the window.
 
Louis Bromfield 

“O Lord, help me to understand that You ain't going to let nothing come my way that You and me together can't handle.”

Anonymous African Boy

I thank God for most this 
amazing 
day; for the leaping greenly 
spirits of trees 
and a blue true dream of sky; 
and for everything 
which is natural, which is 
infinite, which is yes. 

e. e. cummings

Let us pray to the One who holds us in the hollow of
  His hands, 
To the One who holds us in the curve of Her arms, 
To the One whose flesh is the flesh of hills and  
  hummingbirds and angleworms, 
Whose skin is the color of an old Black woman and 
  a young white man; and the color of the leopard 
  and the grizzly bear and the green grass snake, 
Whose hair is like the aurora borealis, rainbows,
  nebulae, waterfalls, and a spider's web, 
Whose eyes sometime shine like the Evening Star,
  and then like fireflies, and then again like an 
  open wound, 
Whose touch is both the touch of life and the touch
  of death, 
And whose name is everyone's, but mostly mine. 
And what shall we pray? 
Let us say, "thank you."

Max Coots
Minister Emeritus of the Canton,N.Y. 
Unitarian Universalist Church