Today, I am turning our prayer process to the workers and business owners who have struggled and faced higher risks during the Pandemic. (Tomorrow we turn to the Medical and First Responders). At this point in the Pandemic, most people realize the crux of conflict between lowering contagion of Covid-19 through isolation, quarantine, lock-downs and social distancing (avoiding public places as much as possible), and the economic imperative to keep supply lines for everyone open, as well as to earn income that provides food, clothing, shelter, healthcare for families and revenue for public programs. Various models for maintaining some balance in this process have been tried, some more creative, some more successful than others. All have required the entire population to think in different ways and stretch beyond our convenience and self-protection.
With those experiences in mind, I encourage you today to turn your prayers toward businesses, workers, and public programs and facilities, all of which involve people. We turn once again, to the Source of life--as we understand the Spiritual-- to acknowledge the complexity of these issues. Yet at this spiritual level, we can affirm the universal nature of exchange of goods and services as a core process of life. We are grateful for this exchange, for those who have supplied us, given of their efforts, their talents, their time and energy, their courage as agents of the flow and sustenance of life--whatever the individual human motivation may be. We are willing to acknowledge that there may have been times when we have ourselves have taken this exchange for granted, especially during the times of great stress, with our own preoccupations and pressures during the Pandemic. In this acknowledgement, we reach a deeper level of gratitude and compassion; we can let go of any grudges we may be holding about the economic realities of the Pandemic. We ask and accept renewed courage and strength in those who are working to maintain businesses, to maintain institutions--from the car repairman, to city maintenance, to teachers of every kind, the grocery workers, restaurant workers, factory workers, delivery and warehouse workers, small businesses to large, public and private. We offer a new respect for their labor. We welcome a new peace that enfolds our workers and businesses within God's protecting, healing Grace. Out of the exchange of life on this level, we affirm a new and stable, inclusive prosperity. And so it is, Amen. (Susan Nettleton)