A Prayer for our Earth

The beautiful icon of Nano Nagle created by the artist Desmond Kyne is alive with colour and symbolism that enables us to get to know ‘…who Nano was and who she is today’.  It depicts a young and vibrant ‘Nano’ which seems to be so apt, especially in this tercentenary year of her birth (1718) when her living legacy continues to inspire and inform who we are and how to act in today’s world.  The many initiatives and activities to celebrate this year are loud testimony to this.

By looking through the icon to the outside greenery and also from the outside garden inwards, this photo somehow symbolises in one image the inter-relationship of all things and also the sacred connected-ness that forms every part of us.

A Prayer for our Earth

All-powerful God, you are present in the
whole universe and in the smallest of your
creatures.

You embrace with your tenderness all that
exists.

Pour out upon us the power of your love, that
we may protect life and beauty.

Fill us with peace, that we may live as brothers
and sisters harming no-one.

O God of the poor, help us to rescue the
abandoned and forgotten of this earth,
so precious in your eyes.

Bring healing to our lives, that we may protect
the world and not prey on it, that we may sow
beauty, not pollution and destruction.

Touch the hearts of those who look only for
gain at the expense of the poor and the earth.

Teach us to discover the worth of each thing,
to be filled with awe and contemplation, to
recognise that we are profoundly united with
every creature as we journey towards your
infinite light.

We thank you for being with us each day.

Encourage us, we pray, in our struggle for
justice, love and peace.

AMEN   

Image Credit: Oonagh O’Brien

(This prayer is from Catholic Rural Life (CRL) from  ‘Praying Our Journey – A Resource for Prayer & Reflection’ prepared by the Nano Nagle Commission, Union of Presentation Sisters of the Blessed Virgin Mary for #Nano300 and beyond).

Framed copies of the Nano Nagle Icon (created with the kinetic stained technique) hang in many of the Presentation Sisters’ Convents worldwide. The original life-size icon can be found at the Nano Nagle Centre, Ballygriffin, County Cork, Ireland.  See link: The Story the Icon