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On All Saints’ Sunday, I used The Beatles’ Let It Be in my sermon.
Sometimes, you’ll hear my decades-old record collection show up at the pulpit. That’s part of who I am as a priest. One of the most life-giving parts of being a priest, I think, is helping people look for God in places where they wouldn’t normally look. God can be heard not only in the Psalms and the Prophets, but sometimes on crackling, popping vinyl.
With that in mind, and thinking about what I said this past Sunday about how I keep running into Stamford residents who see St. Francis as a place that boldly shines as a beacon of God’s hope, love, and justice in this world — a place where we don’t just pray but act — I want to share a song by my favorite rock band, U2.
U2's Please is a lament and a rebuke — a protest against the hollow ritual of offering “thoughts and prayers” without the courage to move to transform them into action. Written as The Troubles viciously and frustratingly dragged on in Northern Ireland in the 1990s, the song is lead singer Bono’s plea to a world paralyzed by piety without action, where prayer and religion too often becomes a shield from responsibility rather than a spark of transformation.
Even secular rock songs such as Please call us out of that posture of passive kneeling into a faith that moves. They remind us that authentic prayer must become nourishment for the work of peace — the bread that fuels our hands and hearts to heal what’s broken. “Please, please, please, get up off your knees,” the song pleas — not to abandon faith, but to live it; to push against the darkness until daylight breaks.
True prayer doesn’t escape the world’s pain; it enters it, wrestles with it, and refuses to let go until blessing and justice are born. It is such a privilege to walk with you as we strive to embody that here at St. Francis — faith that prays deeply, yes, but also stands up, steps out, and shines.
Where are the unexpected places you will find God this week?
Peace,
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