as offered at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Houston, Museum District campus, October 21, 2018
This past week,
the Catholic Church,
canonized Oscar Romero,
the Archbishop of El Salvador,
who was gunned down for speaking out
against his society’s violence
and the violence of right-wing death squads.
Romero reminded us,
“There are many things that can
only be seen through eyes that have cried.”
He reminded us,
that religious communities are at their best
not when they serve the rich and powerful,
but when they listen to the voices
at the margins:
the poor, the oppressed, migrants,
refugees, the targets of police violence,
the children who suffer from war,
anyone targeted by societal violence
for who they are
or who they love,
anyone who suffers from the devastation of climate change.
My prayer for us this morning,
my prayer for us this day,
as we live in a world
where authoritarian regimes
murder journalists in consulates,
where climate change denial is practiced by the powerful,
where people seeking hope
and freedom
and safety
and enough food for their families
are turned away
from the richest country
that has ever existed in human history,
my prayer for us,
is that we will see through eyes that have cried
and that one day,
however, unlikely,
the nation
and the world’s leaders will do so as well.
In the hopes that
we all learn to see the pain
in each other’s eyes,
I say Amen.
