By Marian Wright Edelman
We pray and stand for children who need our voice.
We pray and stand for children blessed by parents who care and for children without a parent or anyone who cares at all.
We pray and stand for children filled with joy and for children whose days and nights are joyless.
We pray and stand for children with hope and for children without hope whose spirits have been dimmed and dashed.
We pray and stand for children high on play and study and laughter and for children high on opioids and cocaine.
We pray and stand for children for whom we pray every day and for children who have no one to pray them along life’s way.
We pray and stand for children who love to read and for children who can’t read at all, for children who learn with excitement and for children told by adults they cannot achieve.
We pray and stand for children who we expect and help to do well and for children whom no one believes in or helps succeed.
We pray for parents, grandparents, teachers, preachers, and political and community leaders that we will be a help and not a hindrance for children we call our own and for all the chidren God created who are part of our family too.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation where small babies die of cold quite legally.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation where small children suffer from hunger quite legally.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation where toddlers and schoolchildren die from guns sold quite legally.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation that lets children be the poorest group of citizens quite legally.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation that lets the rich continue to get more at the expense of the poor, quite legally.
O God, forgive and transform our rich and powerful nation which thinks security rests in missiles and bombs rather than in mothers and in babies.
O God, forgive and transform our rich nation for not giving You sufficient thanks by giving to others their daily bread.
O God, help us never to confuse what is quite legal with what is just and right in Your sight.
Help us to stand together to make America just and right for all Your children.
O God, help us recover our hope for our children’s sake.
Help us recover our courage for our children’s sake.
Help us to recover our discipline for our children’s sake.
Help us to recover our ability to work together for our children’s sake.
Help us to recover our values for our children’s sake.
Help us to recover a spirit of sacrifice for our children’s sake.
Help us to recover our faith in Thee for our children’s sake.
Dear God, thank you for the gift of a new year to serve You
help me to talk right
help me to walk right
help me to see right
help me to feel right
help me to do right
in Your sight.
Edelman is founder and president emerita of the Children’s Defense Fund.
