Love your enemy, you say.
Pray for those who persecute you, you say.
Fine.
A theological exertion of the will–
To wish change upon the Other.
A prodding of your Spirit to move ‘them’ towards the right ends.
She must be lazy: in need of a prompt or invocation.
At any rate, the Divine Will is certain;
The Direction clear.
And my intercession will get Her moving.
So I pray.
She gets up and stretches
and turns towards me.
Amused, She laughs–
Carbonated holiness.
With a yawn of boredom
She points to a new interpretation–
instead of intercession
how about empathy?
To pray as your enemy would–
on their behalf.
And Divine Judgment shifts
its gaze back to me
and mirrors
complacency
manipulation
dependency
addiction
selfishness
myopia
violence
racism
nationalism
colonialism
imperialism
The prayer for intercession
is a prayer of confession.
This is what it means to pray for my enemies.
And now I don’t know who they are.
Prayers of the People 