[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 33 (Tuesday, March 12, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Page S1789]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

                                 prayer

  The Chaplain, Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie, offered the following prayer:
  Gracious Father, we thank You for all of our faculties. But today, we 
praise You especially for the gift of hearing. Help us never to take 
for granted the amazing process by which sounds are registered on our 
eardrums, and carried through the audio nerve to our cerebral cortex to 
be translated into thoughts of recognition, comprehension, and 
response. Through this wondrous gift we can hear the spring songs of 
robins returned, majestic music of a sonata, loved one's words of love 
and hope, and the truths of Your own Word in the Bible as they are read 
or proclaimed from across the reaches of time. But most importantly, 
You have given us listening hearts to hear what You have to say to us 
through the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
  Today, we dedicate our physical and spiritual hearing systems to 
listen more attentively to You and to each other. Forgive us when we 
are so occupied with what we want to say that we do not listen. Often 
we do not hear each other because we have prejudged what he or she will 
say. And there are times when we are so intent on doing our own will 
without consulting You and listening to Your whisper in our souls. We 
say with Samuel, ``Speak Lord, Your servant is listening.'' In the name 
of Him who taught us both to listen and to pray. Amen.

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