One: Holy One, lover of all, knowing that you desire that all people should live in joy and wellness, we ask today for strength and guidance in the work we do to build a just and peaceful society.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted to deny the depth of systematic inequality, to reject the claim that it has anything to do with us or that we benefit from it, help us lay down our denial and accept the truth of human failure to treat all people well.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted to resist analyses that hold the powerful accountable for the harm they do to the powerless and devalued, soften our resistance and call us into the prophetic tradition of speaking the truth and protecting the hurting.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted to avoid the discomfort of facing directly the physical, emotional, and spiritual violence of inequality, beckon us into the discomfort and hold us tenderly as we wrestle with it.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted to respond to inequality with defensiveness and resentment about the claims justice makes on us, strengthen our spirits that we may answer your call.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted, in our guilt, shame, or fear, to freeze in paralysis or to throw up our hands in defeat, help us remember your commandment to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

One: When we are tempted to let anger, sadness, or resignation shut us down, re-ignite our commitment to resist evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.

Many: Open our minds and our hearts, grant us courage, and lead us in the way of love.

All: Holy One, lover of all, we are grateful today and all days for your blessings and demands. As we receive strength and guidance from you, we offer our lives to a broken and beautiful world, that we might heal its brokenness even as we celebrate its beauty. Amen.
 
Amanda Udis-Kessler, March 4, 2022

Written for the Reconciling Ministries Network
(Anyone is welcome to modify this litany to address specific forms of systematic inequality such as racism/white supremacy, sexism/patriarchy, heterosexism/homophobia, class inequality, ableism, Islamophobia, or other kinds of inequality.)
 
About the Author
Amanda Udis-Kessler is a songwriter and published composer of sacred music (everysoulmusic.com; queersacredmusic.com), a writer (sermons, other worship materials, adult faith formation curricula, a sociology monograph, and other writings), and community educator on matters of religion, social inequality, and social justice. She has a sociology doctorate from Boston College and a certificate from the Iliff School of Theology. She is the Director of Assessment and Program Review at The Colorado College. Contact her at amanda@amandaudiskessler.com.