A Prayer

There seems to be a lot of hardship, sickness, and sadness in the lives of people around me lately.  Although I often feel paralyzed at knowing what to do to help, I found great comfort and agreement in this beautiful prayer by Mother Theresa:

Make us worthy, Lord, to serve our fellow men throughout the world,

who live and die in poverty and hunger.

Give them through our hands, this day, their daily bread

and by our understanding love give peace and joy.

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace.

That where there is hatred, I may bring love,

That where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness,

That where there is discord, I may bring harmony,

That where there is error, I may bring truth,

That where there is doubt, I may bring faith,

That where there is despair, I may bring hope,

That where there is shadows, I may bring light,

That where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted,

To understand than to be understood,

To love than to be loved.

For it is by forgetting self that one finds.

It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.

It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.

Amen.