Customer Reviews

For Praying Out Loud: Interfaith Prayers for Public Occasions

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Because of the vast theological diversity within their congregations, Unitarian Universalists have become masters of inclusive prayer. Retired Unitarian Universalist minister L. Annie Foerster gathers that wisdom in For Praying Out Loud.

About 20% of the book is devoted to several chapters that offer guidance for composing prayers for interfaith settings. The remainder of the book is a collection of prayers divided into five themes: unity & diversity, peace & justice, healing & remembrance, gratitude & praise, and dedications & ordinations. Most, but not all, of these prayers were written by Unitarian Universalist ministers.

The first part of the book is designed to help people write well-constructed, meaningful, even poetic prayer that are accessible to people of a variety of religious traditions. Even though inclusiveness is the goal, Foerster reminds us not to just "reduce our individual traditions and writings to bland pap in order to make them more inclusive." Frequent references are made to examples from the second part of the book.

The sample prayers come from a variety of settings: an interfaith Thanksgiving service, racial justice gatherings, interfaith organization meetings, invocations for governmental bodies, veteran's memorials, peace gatherings, Coming Out Day programs, hospital services, and civic organization invocations.

Some of my favorites include "A Litany of Faith and Hope," co-authored by Muslims and Unitarian Universalists; "Prayer After a Riot," during the riots after the police accused of beating Rodney King were acquitted; "For Those Who Are Wounded or Fearful," for patients on a locked mental health unit; and "May Love Hallow Every Home," a benediction for an affordable housing site.

For Praying Out Loud is a valuable source of guidance and inspiration for any minister or laypeople called upon to lead prayer in an interfaith setting. Even people who don't regularly lead public prayer may find their religious vocabulary expanded by reading For Praying Out Loud.

I use this book a lot for reflections, interfaith prayers, spiritual thoughts, etc. This would highly benefit anyone working as a chaplain or minister in a nonsectarian setting. Or if you just like to rattle the cages in an egocentric environment. "I can't believe you used "Goddess" in a prayer in a Catholic hospital!" Yes, I did. And people loved it.

In an increasingly diverse world of religious and non-religious beliefs, those who desire to be inclusive and respectful will find this volume a perfect resource for those occasions when they are called upon to offer opening words (invocations) or closing words (benedictions) at public occasions.

This is an excellent book for any minister, but exceptional for Interfaith Ministers. The prayers are very good for all occasions. This book uses many names for God. For example: Spirit of Life and Love, Spirit of Ages Creator of Life and Love. I will be using this book a lot.

The book was helpful but not what I expected. The focus is entirely on interfaith prayers and the examples, while uplifting, were a little on the esoteric side for my purposes.