God did you know when you gave us creativity
that we would use it to create a tool to kill each other
with the tiniest movement of our finger?
Around our world, bullets are sown into gun chambers
and we reap destruction, life after life mowed down in blood.
Hear our prayer for all who will hold a gun today:
the soldier on the battlefield,
the lone gunman planning a massacre,
the gang member hunting a rival,
the raging husband threatening a family,
the depressed person wanting to end it all,
the playing children who open a drawer
they’ve been told not to open.
Hear our prayer for those who will die today from bullet wounds,
may they rest in peace,
and for all who will be maimed and scarred in body and spirit,
and for all who grieve, and for all who live in fear.
And we pray for those who by shooting someone
will turn their own heart to stone.
You know Lord, that this is a systemic problem:
we live in a gun culture, where shooting is glorified,
and fortunes are made from the production and trafficking of guns.
Today we pray for an advent miracle,
that you would open our eyes to a way forward
against powers and principalities that feed on bloodshed.
Show us a way that politicians and lawmakers and average people
can work together to make a safer society,
a society free from gun violence.
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I am a Mennonite pastor currently teaching theology at Conrad Grebel University College in Waterloo, Ontario. I’ve served congregations in Ontario and most recently, Alberta.