Praying for Peace in Ukraine
Rev. Lorraine Ceniceros, Conference Minister
And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. - 1 Corinthians 13:13
On the morning of February 24th, we awoke to news that Ukraine had been invaded by the Russian military. We were invited to join our hearts in prayer each day at noon with Evangelishe Landeskirche, one of our mission partners in Baden Germany. Since then, we have watched in horror the ongoing Russian hostilities against the people of Ukraine, and the humanitarian crisis that is the result of the ongoing invasion.
In the past week I have been in contact with the Rev. Eleanor McCormick who graciously provided me with an excerpt from her February 27th sermon in Karlsruhe Grötzingen. In this piece, Rev. McCormick is reflecting on the use of praying for peace in the face of devastating events. With Eleanor’s permission, I bring you her words for contemplation.
Rev. Eleanor McCormick
“On Thursday evening (February 24th), following the prayer service for peace, I missed my bus. So, I walked. Not through the woods, because I’ve read too many German fairytales to know that is ill advised. I walked home to Thomashof via Durlach. All humor aside, I walked, and I prayed as I walked. I prayed for peace. I prayed for those fleeing their homes, crowded into subway stations, hiding in bomb shelters, frantically calling family and friends in hopes of finding safety. I prayed.
As we’ve talked about in confirmation class quite recently, I don’t pray because I believe in a simple prayer equation: I ask something of God and I receive it or along the lines of my ask, God fixes. I don’t think that's how prayer works. And the question of why the hell one would start praying in the face of such horror, human failure, and crimes against humanity is absolutely valid.
The German theologian Petra Bahr puts it this way:
"One would be tempted to think that a prayer for peace is a ridiculous gesture. But those who are present know that this is not true. The prayer for peace is not just an expression of the petition "God, have mercy." It is the intrusion of another reality that asserts the peace of God as a possibility, a gap through which comes hope, even the power to negotiate, to have political skill, to persevere…”
As a colleague of mine in the Berlin Protestant Church adds:
"I do not pray to order peace from God, I pray to remain able to act, to remain soft and open, in spite of the terrible news blow after blow. I pray for strength to be able to act myself and to work for peace, through demonstrations, political influence, through charitable work. And I pray for the things in which I am helpless. For the events where I want to help so badly but cannot. I pray for the things that would paralyze me if I couldn't pray."
I prayed. And I walked. And as I walked past the Durlach Friedhof/Cemetery a man just ahead of me stopped at the small footpath that leads to the Cemetery Chapel. He crossed himself and then he walked past me in what felt like slow motion. I did not know him and yet he spoke directly to me saying (simply): Ich hoffe, “dass die Liebe gewinnt”/I hope that love wins and then he kept walking.
I managed to mumble a me too/“ich auch” and then the tears began to fall, and I couldn’t stop them. Looking at the tombstones for sale on the corner of the cemetery and main road, I thought about death - and how much of it we might see with yet another needless, senseless war. I walked faster, trying to dry my eyes with the corner of my coat. And as I picked up my pace, I felt like I just wanted to scream. I wanted to scream really, really, loudly - just to release the tension in my chest that was holding so many questions. Why war? Why now? What next? What could I do? What can I say? Where’s God?
How did you feel on Thursday? What did you feel? What questions made it seem harder to breathe or easy/ier to cry?
The only feeling I must compare to it is the feeling I had, sitting in my high school classroom, watching the TV when the second plane hit the twin towers in New York City on September 11, 2001. My peers were trying desperately to reach parents who worked in those buildings, my teachers were speechless, all of us were reeling from the trauma of seeing hate weaponized.
On Thursday, as I walked further up the hill from Durlach to Thomashof the sky seemed to just open. From a calm, almost warm evening, heavy rain fell, the temperature dropped, and the wind picked up into big menacing gusts. I didn’t need to find a name for my feelings. It was exactly as that storm felt on my skin. I made it home - wet and cold - feeling empty. But I went back to my desk to read the epistle I had chosen weeks ago for this Sunday 1 Corinthians 1-13. It is an ode/a poem to love. On Thursday evening the text sounded different in my ears, than it had sounded on Wednesday and yet they were the (very) same words. And I tried to listen to what its author, Paul, was saying. What, if anything, would this text have to say to me, to us, today? On this day? Love wins. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Just like the stranger on the hill. What I heard, what I hear in this text, is love wins - for it is the greatest…”
Love wins, friends, love wins. Let us keep praying for the people of Ukraine who are suffering in this invasion, for the people of Europe who are opening their hearts and homes to help those who have now become refugees and let us not forget the Russian civilians who are protesting the invasion at the risk of arrest and imprisonment.
As providence would have it, I will be ivisiting our ecumenical partner, the Evangelische Landeskirche in Baden, Germany, from April 5 through April 13. I have been invited as an honored guest representing the Conference, a valued member of the partnership. On April 10th, a service and reception will be held to commemorate the transition of leadership as current Bishop Jochen Cornelius-Bundschuh retires and the newly elected Bishop, Heike Springhart takes office. The occasion also marks Bishop Springhart as the first female Bishop of the church as they celebrate the 50th anniversary of women’s ordination in the Protestant church. I am eager to honour and strengthen our long-standing partnership with the Evangelical Church in Baden. We have much to learn from each other and we can support each other, as together we strive to help create a more just and equitable world.
Many blessings as we walk this journey of faith together,
Lorraine