Holy One,

We begin life connected—connected to the woman whose body nurtures us, whose heart teaches ours to beat, whose every breath triggers the chemical reactions that spur on the miracle of our human becoming.  From our births we know we need other people to survive.

Sensing the necessity of others for our existence–that without you, I cannot be—our earliest ancestors created families.  From the beginning, those families have come in an intriguing array of shapes and sizes.  The Hebrew and Christian Scriptures offer a sampling:

Hagar and Ishmael, Moses and Pharaoh’s daughter, Naomi and Ruth, David and Jonathan, Mary, Joseph, Jesus, and his siblings, Timothy, Eunice, and Lois.

The ancestors who gave us these stories must have known we’d need them, that we’d need to see that family is a holy thing, no matter who’s a part of it.

Though families are sacred communities, they also are composed of human beings, which means — they are flawed.  Sometimes families nurture; sometimes they wound.  And so, our first prayer today is for the wholeness of all families, no matter their shape, size, or make-up.

Our prayer is this:  May all families love each other a little better today, feel a little less stressed today, have a little more fun today, draw a little closer together today.  And may every single family become holy, healthy, healing, and whole.  Amen.

(My offering at the Cobb County Interfaith Prayer Vigil for Marriage Equality held at Unity North, Marietta, GA, on April 26, 2015.)