Newtown: A Prayer on a Horrible Day

Chaverim - dear friends,

Today is a difficult day for everyone. I know that we are all hurting for the innocent people of Newtown, CT, and we are feeling scared and vulnerable ourselves. I don't know if this will, or can, help, but I wanted to share with you a prayer that Rabbi Menachem Creditor wrote earlier today. It doesn't give any answers, but I felt that it expressed some of the anguish and pain I feel today. I hope it helps you make some semblance of sense of this as well. Let us all pray for peace, safety and security, and an end to the gun violence that plagues this nation.

Shalom,

Rabbi Gerber

A Prayer in Wake of a School Shooting

Rabbi Menachem Creditor

in mourning and solidarity with the community of Newtown, Connecticut

Adonai,

Your children and teachers 

are dead and wounded. 

Our souls are burning with anguish. 

Until When, Adonai?! (Ps. 6:3)

How long must we fear?

You have given us the tools of progress, 

and we wield them to hurt.

Our plowshares have jagged edges,

and children are dying.

We have sinned.

And we continue to sin.

We have not done what we can.

We could have saved precious lives

by changing our ways

and we have not.

Your children, our children,

dead and wounded. 

We ask You, Adonai, for

the strength to face what numbs us,

the strength to hear the screams,

the resolve to not let our vulnerability make us feel powerless. We are not.

For we, Adonai, we are your images, 

and we are being erased.

We are erasing ourselves, 

and in so doing we are erasing You.

We have so much accursed power.

It is the curse of this power,

and the sin that waits by the door (Gen. 4:7)

that leads us to permit evil, 

which is the same as doing it ourselves,

which is the same as erasing the Holy Name.

Your Name.

Dear God, this hurts so much.

Teach us, Guide us, 

Make us save each other.

Dear vulnerable images of God, 

here and everywhere,

we pray that you, 

in God's Name,

and in the name of those souls we have lost,

remember that comforting each other might come first,

but the need will come again if nothing changes.

We can master this evil. (Gen. 4:7)

May this world know no more hatred and violence.

May people live in peace.

And let us say: Amen.