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Demonstrators commemorating Malaysia Airlines flight 17

Participants in the 20th International AIDS Conference in Melbourne, Australia, march through the streets of the city holding signs commemorating six conference delegates who died when Malaysia Airlines flight 17 was shot down over Ukraine on the eve of the gathering.

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Intercessions

We give thanks for:

  • Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox and evangelical churches and councils of churches in Malaysia and Singapore which have witnessed to the gospel and ministered to groups who are discriminated against and marginalized
  • economic developments that have enhanced the standard of living for many
  • policies and practices that seek to sustain the environment and its resources
  • those who have sought to further ethnic and religious harmony.

We pray for:

  • more just, participatory and democratic rule
  • locally-determined economic development that lessens inequalities and protects natural resources
  • greater ethnic and religious understanding and cooperation
  • the forging of national identities and visions that genuinely include all the diverse people in these countries.

 

Prayers

O God of Life,

you have placed us on this earth to usher in Your Kingdom of love and compassion.
Forgive us when our social witness has failed to build bridges of peace and understanding among all peoples.

Let there be growing spaces of understanding, tolerance and harmony among the different ethnic and religious communities.

Grant that Your church in Malaysia will deepen its influence to work for peace, to be prophetic in calling for justice and caring in sustaining a sharing fellowship with all people.

So rule our hearts and prosper our endeavours of good,
to the honor of Your Holy name, Jesus Christ our Lord, we pray.
AMEN

(© 2014 Council of Churches in Malaysia)

 

O God,
keep our churches faithful in bearing witness to your great love for all humanity.
Deliver us from intolerance and all that hinder others from seeking you.
Bless our country and guide our political leaders so that their fruit may abound
and the interest of the people is served.
Grant grace to our priests, pastors and ministers so that they may be diligent in the study of your Word and in the discharge of the work they have been called.
Amen.

(Lee K. Tham, Singapore, September 2014)


We praise you for the beauty we see around us,
for the infinite variety of your creation –
the skies, the mountains, the valleys,
the plains, the rivers and the seas.
The bounty of your creation adds richness and providence
to our daily life.

We thank you for the gift of life,
and for the opportunities we have to share in your purposes
as stewards of creation.
Give us grace through your life-giving spirit
never to turn back on our responsibility
for the preservation of your creation.

Your Son, our Lord, came to our world in the form of Jesus,
that we might more clearly see your love in action
and your power over evil, sin and death.
Teach and inspire us Lord,
never to be afraid of the power of those
who are greedy and abusive of the resources
of your world and of others.
With the love of Jesus in our hearts,
we can transform every human situation
into what is good and acceptable in your sight.

Loving God, as we look to the future,
increase our faith and confidence
in your work in history.
You will take care of the poor and the powerless;
your prophets will speak against injustices;
and your people will embrace each other in love
because of Jesus Christ.

We pray only
that the church will be more courageous than cautious;
that the church will not remain silent
when people are suffering;
that the church will not “pass by on the other side”
when the wounded earth is waiting to be healed.

We praise you, Creator God, that you still make all
things new through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

(Prayer of an indigenous church community in Malaysia, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 1999, p.24.)

 

Where families are fractured by domestic upheavals,
and children forced onto the streets to fight for survival,
where more resources are spent on arms and destruction
and less attention paid to sickness and starvation:

Come, Holy Spirit
heal our wounds
renew the whole creation!

Where the acquisition of things has become an obsession
and the worth of human beings is measured by their possessions,
where our air, trees and seas are besieged by pollution
and purblind mercenary greed threatens our environment:

Come, Holy Spirit
heal our wounds
renew the whole creation!

Where countries are split apart by communalism and racism
and innocent blood is spilt by wanton acts of terrorism,
where internecine warfare sets nation against nation
and a nuclear holocaust looms ominous on our horizon:

Come, Holy Spirit
heal our wounds
Renew the whole creation!

(© Cecil Rajendra, Malaysia. WPCU 1999 p.24.)

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