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From the President:
 I Believe in the
Power of Prayer
I recently acquired an iPod. Now, this is not an everyday acquisition for someone of my age. And, furthermore, learning to operate an electronic gadget can cause a great deal of consternation. However, not only have I learned to operate it efficiently; but I can even purchase songs from iTunes and both download and upload them. Whew! Then my daughter bought me fancy Bose earphones for Christmas, so now I can plug in and bee-bop across the kitchen to all my favourite tunes in my own personal music nirvana.
I love all kinds of music, but Billy Joel is one of my favourite pop artists, and I find his 1993 tune River of Dreams especially moving. It’s a song about a person looking for spiritual meaning, and I often reflect on the haunting words:
I've been searching for something
Taken out of my soul
Something I'd never lose
Something somebody stole
It is sobering to imagine someone feeling so spiritually bereft. At WICC, our mission is to share our spirituality, to pray together, to grow in faith and understanding. What a powerful mission! As human beings, our search for true spirituality is a life-long journey and this search cannot be done in a vacuum. We need each other: the unique wisdom of our different traditions; the diverse life experiences from which we can grow; and the community that we can build as we pray and worship together.
I believe in the power of prayer and I believe, when we unite in prayer, the effect can be overwhelming. I well remember watching the fall of the Berlin Wall on TV on November 9, 1989; we watched in awe as the East German regime collapsed before our eyes. This historical event had its beginnings in 1983, when a Lutheran Church in Leipzig started holding prayer vigils every Monday night at 5 p.m. These “Prayers for Peace” vigils spread throughout East Germany and created the “New Forum” movement, which led very quickly to the demise of the GDR. It all began with a few people consistently praying!
Every year on the first Friday of March, we in Canada join people in over 170 countries around the world to participate in the World Day of Prayer. It is a profound act of faith and unity when people meet together to pray for the deepest needs of this world: HIV/AIDS; women and children trapped in poverty and abuse; environmental issues; racial discrimination; and much more.
Over the next two years, as I serve as President of WICC, it is my prayer that we can continue to grow together through sharing our spirituality, praying together and working together.
For he (Christ) is our peace
Who has made us all one
And has broken down the dividing wall of hostility. (Ephesians 2:14)
Judith Snowdon is the President of the Women’s Inter-Church Council of Canada. She lives in St. Joseph-de-Kent, NB.
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