Prayer for the Dedication of Community Church's New Building

by the Reve. Melanie Morel-Ensminger
Sunday, April 10, 2011

This prayer is dedicated to my brother in faith and partner in ministry to the North Shore UU congregation, the Reverend Jim VanderWeele, without whom I don't think I could do the kind of ministry we are sharing together in Greater new Orleans.

Let us bring our hearts and mind together in a spirit of prayer and meditation.
We come together on this glorious spring day
to celebrate a new beginning,
for this Unitarian Universalist congregation and its ministry --
a near-miraculous phoenix-like rising,
not from ashes of fire, but from muck and mold of flood waters.

Here we are gathered in this beautiful new building,
the result of the work and dedication,
not only of this congregation,
not only of the three New Orleans-area congregations,
but of the combined efforts and commitment
of religious liberals all over the country.
We are filled with the spirit of gratitude.

This morning, we invoke the presence of the Spirit of Life
to bless this building and this ministry,
this congregation, its relationships, and its future:

While we know that this building will be the meeting place
of many like-minded people,
we pray that it will not be a Clubhouse,
where people’s connections and relations are limited to specific projects;

While we know that this building will take in many persons
who are spiritually wounded,
we pray that it will not be a Hospital,
where people will recuperate and get better and then leave;

While we know that this building will be a venue
for music and art and culture,
we pray that it will not be a Theater,
where passive audiences come to be entertained;

While we know that this building will be a center of learning,
we pray that it will not be a School,
where people gain knowledge and then move on.

May this building instead be as a Ship,
carefully loaded with hopes and dreams and plans,
riding on waters both smooth and rough,
carrying an entire community of diverse people,
picking up new passengers along the way,
bringing them all to the goals they have set before themselves –
nothing less than the rejuvenation and redemption of the Greater New Orleans area.

All this we pray in the names of all those who have gone before us
in religious liberalism in the Crescent City and beyond,
and in the names as well of all in life that we hold
to be true and noble and worthy – in short, Holy.
AMEN – ASHE – SHALOM – SALAAM – NAMASTE – BLESSED BE!