[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 46 (Friday, March 29, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Page S3171]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

                                 prayer

  The Chaplain, Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie, offered the following prayer:
  Lord God, Sovereign of this Nation, we praise You for the gift of 
authentic hope. More than wishful thinking, yearning, or shallow 
optimism, we turn to You for lasting hope. We have learned that true 
hope is based on the expectation of the interventions of Your spirit 
that always are on time and in time. You are the intervening Lord of 
the Passover, the opening of the Red Sea, the giving of the Ten 
Commandments. You have vanquished the forces of evil, death, and fear 
through the cross and the Resurrection. All through the history of our 
Nation, You have blessed us with Your providential care. It is with 
gratitude that we affirm, ``Blessed is the Nation whose God is the 
Lord.''--Psalm 33:12.
  May this sacred season culminating in the Holy Week before us, 
including Passover, Good Friday, and Easter, be a time of rebirth of 
hope in us. May Your spirit of hope displace the discordant spirit of 
cynicism, discouragement, and disunity. Hope through us, O God of hope. 
Flow through us patiently until we hope for one another what You have 
hoped for us. Then Lord, give us the vision and courage to confront 
those problems that have made life seem hopeless for some people. Make 
us communicators of hope. We trust our lives, the work of the Senate, 
and the future of our Nation into Your all-powerful hands. In the name 
of the Hope of the World. Amen.

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