Sovereign God, you are a jealous God, and you demand our entire being and our full measure of devotion.
While we may not consider as idols the things that compete for our time or distract us from even the simplest awareness of your presence in our everyday moments, nonetheless, like gods in our lives, our desires have become more directive and your direction less desirable.
Shine your light on those hidden affections that have, if we’re honest with ourselves, overshadowed, or even eclipsed, our devotion to you.
Help us take inventory of the things that have wended their way into our very being: our pursuit for success, our desire for approval, our comfort with a certain manner of living. Call to our awareness how our fear of rejection, our paralyzing anger over our own shortcomings, and our cowardice in the face of evil, have become stumbling blocks to the righteousness you demand of us.
How easily we have installed these false gods into our daily lives, allowing them to govern our behavior, to influence our decisions, and to stand in the way of our faithfulness to you.
Enable us to turn our backs on these idols. For no thing, no one, is like you, O Lord. You alone are great, and your name only is mighty in power.
In the strength of your holy name, we return to you and entrust into your keeping the living of this day. Amen.
Jeremiah 10:6
Ezekiel 14:1–6
Fear God in the true sense of the word means to love God, respect God, honor God, and all of this can only be done by loving your neighbor, treating him justly and mercifully, and in all ways endeavoring to protect him from injustice and cruelty, thus obeying, as far as our human frailty will permit, the great immutable law of righteousness.
—Theodore Roosevelt
Join us to pray the Rosary for Congress and the nation – each Friday at 11:30 am in the Interfaith Staff Prayer Room – 467 Cannon – and via Zoom. All are welcome. Rosaries and prayer sheets are provided. For zoom link or more information, contact Karen.Bronson@mail.house.gov Hosted by the Office of the Chaplain
The Interfaith Staff Prayer Room is open for congressional staff to use for personal prayer and meditation. For questions – email StaffPrayerRoom@mail.house.gov