[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 139 (Friday, September 8, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S12873]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

                                 prayer

  The Chaplain, Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie, offered the following prayer:
  And God who gives beginnings, gives the end: a place for broken 
things too broke to mend.--John Masefield.
  Almighty God, Lord of ultimate judgment, and unlimited grace, we come 
to You for the healing of the profound grief we have over the 
resignation of our colleague Robert Packwood and the circumstances that 
necessitated it. We thank You that, ``never yet a abyss was found 
deeper than your love could sound.'' We ask that Your healing grace and 
mercy, restitution and release, may sound in the depth of his heart 
today. Heal his brokeness and remind him that You have plans for him, 
to give him a future and a hope. We praise You for his immense 
contribution to the work of this Senate through the years. Give him 
strength and courage as he begins a new phase of his life sustained by 
Your love and guidance.
  Lord, we also ask for Your healing of a pain of a very different kind 
of brokeness we are all feeling today. We ask You to heal our divisions 
and bring deeper unity. After our human evaluations are made and 
judgments rendered, we confess with the Psalmist, ``If You Lord, should 
mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with 
You that You may be feared. I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in 
His Word I do hope.''--Psalm 130: 3-4.
  With an acute awareness of our own needs, give us humility to trust 
You with our weaknesses and praise You for our strengths. Give us a 
renewed commitment to exemplify strong moral leadership. Most of all, 
bind us together in greater oneness as, with one mind and heart, we 
press on to the work You have given us to do together. In our Lord's 
name. Amen.


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