The Office of the Chaplain United States House of Representatives

Opening Prayer

04/02/2025
Chaplain Margaret Grun Kibben

Generous and munificent God, You have graced each one of us according to the measure You have judged worthy of our abilities. In this we each rejoice, and together we celebrate the multitude of gifts and opportunities You lay before this House.

Hear our gratitude this evening that in this time and place, You have brought this body together, each individual representative of, not just their constituencies, but of a wide array of opinions, talents, concerns, and convictions. Especially on this day we give You thanks for our newest Members and share in the enthusiasm and support that surrounds them.

Bless then each of us and each Member of this legislative body, that we would never lose sight of the fact that all that we have, and all that we are, are all from Your hand. May our stewardship of these gifts, these diverse perspectives, this weight of responsibilities, serve to glorify You in these days.

In Your matchless name we pray. Amen.

Thought of the Week

I suddenly saw that all the time it was not I who had been seeking God, but God who had been seeking me. I had made myself the center of my own existence and had my back turned to God. All the beauty and truth which I had discovered had come to me as a reflection of his beauty, but I had kept my eyes fixed on the reflection and was always looking at myself. But God had brought me to the point at which I was compelled to turn away from the reflection, both of myself and of the world, which could only mirror my own image. During that night the mirror had been broken, and I had felt abandoned because I could no longer gaze upon the image of my own reason and the finite world which it knew. God had brought me to my knees and made me acknowledge my own nothingness, and out of that knowledge, I had been reborn. I was no longer the center of my life, and therefore, I could see God in everything.

—Bede Griffiths

Featured Events