[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Page 18364]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

                                 prayer

  The guest Chaplain, Rabbi Solomon Schiff, offered the following 
prayer:
  Heavenly Creator, we invoke Thy blessings upon those gathered here, 
loyal servants in the vineyard of human compassion. Bless, we pray, the 
Members of this body who have accepted the high privilege and sacred 
responsibility of serving in the sanctified Halls of the U.S. Senate. 
Unto their hands was entrusted the mantle of leadership on behalf of 
the American people. May they discharge their responsibilities with 
courage and commitment. Grant that their deliberations will be free 
from rancor and bitterness, but that they will be ruled instead by 
wisdom, purpose, and dedication.
  O, divine Healer, bind our Nation together. Sustain the dreams of 
those who founded our great Republic, that through our sharing with one 
another the ideals which gave it birth--the ideals of liberty, justice, 
equality, and freedom--we will preserve and strengthen these ideals for 
all future time. In this way we will help bring about a society based 
on moral and ethical values and ensure that the new millennium will 
mark not only a change in calendar but a change in character as well.
  We will then lead the family of nations to an unending era of 
tranquility, justice, and universal peace. Amen.

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