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In memory of Jim Doherty
Born Christmas Day 1965
Died 15th Oct 1972
For a West Belfast child in the 1950s, Religious Knowledge (R.K. as it was known) was a truly incomprehensible thing, reducible (in my case) to a handful of mysterious memories which, I suspect, I share in common with many of my generation.
The first one is a little book called the Catechism. It was written in a strange language, had nothing to do with ordinary life, but had to be learned by rote – often with the encouragement of the cane. I recall being caned at the age of ten for not being able to define “transubstantiation”. Only later did I discover that it has defied the greatest brains in the Church for two thousand years.
Then there was the preparation for First Holy Communion. This involved inventing a suitably impressive litany of sins so that the shadowy Presence on the other side of the confessional grill would not feel obliged to interrogate me further: I had already given him something worthwhile to forgive. Then the dire warnings about not biting the sacred host lest it add to the sufferings of Jesus.
Finally there was Confirmation Day. Our headmaster, a scary Man of Sorrows* called Mr. Duffin, led us in a vigorous rendering of “Faith of Our Fathers… living still – in spite of dungeon, fire and sword…” We left that day filled with the Holy Ghost, instantly endowed with Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel, Fortitude, Knowledge, Piety and Fear of the Lord. It was hard to tell the exact difference between Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel and Knowledge, but you certainly knew what Fear of the Lord meant: you only had to look at Mr. Duffin – and our teachers at R.K. time. They always seemed to be looking over their shoulders, as if their jobs depended on us being able to parrot to perfection every single syllable of that incomprehensible Catechism, no questions asked – and no answers offered (except what was already there in black and white).
Roseleen Walsh is one of my generation. It was my privilege to get to know her when I was working in Springhill Community House with Fr. Des Wilson on a community history project which invited local people to record for posterity their memories of life in West Belfast, especially during “The Troubles”. The project produced some eighty titles, many of which can be found in the Linenhall Library in Belfast.
Roseleen was one of our most gifted and prolific authors, equally at home in poetry, the composition and performance of monologues and plays. She has deservedly established herself as one of Belfast’s foremost playwrights. Her work has been performed many times, both locally and down South. A few years ago, she was invited to submit several poems to an American publication recording Women’s Voices of The Troubles. She has also been involved in the work of the New Belfast Community Arts’ Initiative – one of the biggest community arts’ projects in these islands – as a visiting poet in local schools.
But it is the way in which she has continued to wrestle with the imponderables of the Catechism that impresses me now. She has a precious gift – that “Understanding” which eluded so many of us – of being able to “ground” theological abstractions in real life situations, bringing them alive, as Jesus did – and as the Holy Spirit does, sent as His vicar on earth to lead us into the fullness of truth (Gospel of St. John, 15.26, 16.12-15).
Here is a working-class mother, who knows what it means to rear a family in desperate times, who has suffered personal heartache in the doing of it, who knows the struggle of trying to make ends meet, who has risen above her own preoccupations to address the suffering of those around her, especially that of young people; and who has had to bear the calumny of others as a result.
I have been deeply moved by this little book – as I was by her earlier ones on The Way of the Cross and The Mysteries of the Rosary – and thoroughly recommend it to anyone still on a personal journey…
Joe Sheehy
12th April 2008
* Years later, I learned that he had witnessed the murder of his brothers at the hands of sectarian
I took these photos a few years ago in Lourdes with my mobile phone. Some people see only the rock while others see what I see. What I captured isn’t a vision but the formation of rock at a certain angle which project images of a religious nature and because these rocks are at one of the holiest places on the planet it is an indication that as Joseph Mary Plunkett put it ‘Rocks are his written word’ so they are there to be read and reflected upon. What does this mean? Well I have to state I have no idea but I’m happy enough to have taken the photos; my daughter was with me at the time and afterwards on a few occasions we both looked at the many photos I’d taken and neither of us noticed anything that didn’t look right in the photos; it was in fact a friend called Kathleen who had never been to Lourdes who first saw the figures. We were on a bus to Knock shrine to celebrate the feast of The Immaculate Conception. Kathleen was making this journey to ask God in some way to reveal to her the truth about her son’s Gerard’s death; he had died tragically only a few months earlier. I believe that you only see in the pictures what you personally are meant you see.
Come Holy Spirit
Fill the hearts of thy faithful
And enkindle in them the fire of your love
Send forth thy Spirit and they shall be created
And they shall renew the face of the earth.
(I learned the above prayer at school and say it many times daily if I need to call on The Holy Spirit or
sometimes just if I’m happy)
This little prayer book-let is a follow up to ‘The Stations of the Cross from a Woman’s perspective’ and ‘Sharing My Faith (a little)’ all three can be downloaded from my website www.roseleenwalsh.com Once again I feel compelled to share how I feel spiritually at the risk of seeming foolish. But this is something I feel I must do. I hope anyone who reads these prayers will get some comfort and hopefully be inspired to pray to and listen to The Holy Spirit. I will relate the two main experiences I’ve had with The Holy Spirit though I’m certain there are many more that I haven’t been aware of. When you bring The Holy Spirit into your life good things will happen and the road ahead walked with confidence.
“The Spirit comes to help us in our weakness. For when we cannot choose words in order to pray properly, The Spirit himself expresses our plea in a way that could never be put into words and God knows everything in our heart, knows perfectly well what he means and that the pleas of the saints expressed by The Spirit are according to The Mind of God. (St Paul’s Letter to the Romans)
Besides my Confirmation which I made when I was about seven years old in the 1950’s, my first encounter with The Holy Spirit that I can remember, was when I was about seventeen in 1967. It was at a Legion of Mary meeting in Regina Coeli hostel on the Andersonstown Road, where now stands The Kennedy Centre. We had visitors from the Curia which is one of the governing bodies of the Legion; during each weekly meeting a lengthy piece from the legion hand book would be read. Anyone who has ever had a Legion hand book will understand that it is quiet difficult to read and also to understand; usually the spiritual director will explain its meaning after the reading. The Legionary who would usually have read at our meeting was absent and so I had this dread that I would be asked to read. The sweat broke on me and I felt so ill that I couldn’t move even to make an excuse to leave the meeting; even as I write this the pain and humiliation that I felt daily overcomes me. I couldn’t read at school, not one whole sentence. My entire school days were spent trying to avoid the reading period; for two reasons, one was I just couldn’t read, all the words danced around the page and I couldn’t quiet get a hold of any one word, the other reason was that the teacher usually made me stand up to read as though I were some sort of exhibit. That pain sometimes was more than I could bear alone, for I seemed to be the worst reader in the whole class. And now at that moment in my mind all these people were going to find out how stupid I was; I was beginning to feel that familiar sense of humiliation breaking through as my face became redder and redder. My mind was the only part of me that was working; but I suddenly felt I was not alone, that something or someone was with me, and I began to pray to the Holy Ghost asking Him to open my mind and help me to read; I pleaded and begged him, then the meeting began.
When I was asked to read, I picked up the book not knowing what was going to happen. I began to read and the words somehow flowed from my mouth. Not one single stumble or stammer. I have been able to read ever since and I thank God and the Holy Spirit for that gift; and so it is a wonderful honour for me to have been privileged to read the Word of the Lord in Clonard Monastery for the past eighteen years. I continued to pray to the Holy Spirit, I seek his guidance on everything in my life. One Thursday at the Clonard Thursday Novena to Our Mother of Perpetual Help, Fr. Clancy gave an encouraging talk about The Holy Spirit, saying how we could change our lives if we wanted to by bringing the Holy Spirit into our daily life. He also spoke about the power of holy water. It only takes a prayer and a little thought. So I began again to talk to and concentrate on the Holy Spirit. I bought a holy water font and put it on the wall beside my hall door and encouraged everyone going out to bless themselves and also at night I would bless the hall door and stairs and ask the Holy Spirit to protect us and keep us safe. If I was worried or concerned about anyone, I would make the sign of the cross with holy water and ask the Holy Spirit to help or protect that person. This is a great thing to be able to do, to trust the Holy Spirit; and the person you’re praying for doesn’t have to know.
My next big experience with the Holy Spirit was in 1997. It was the first Sunday in June 1997 and was known as Drumcree Sunday. The Orange Order from Portadown was allowed to march up the Garvaghy Road against the residences’ wishes and so there were widespread protests all over the north of Ireland, resulting in many people being injured. That Sunday started as usual for us with early mass in Clonard. As we returned home and I went to walk in through our front door, I stopped and couldn’t move for a brief moment, Martin my husband asked what was wrong and I told him our 13 year old daughter Maíre was going to be shot. He laughed and told me to catch myself on. When I was finally able to move, I got some holy water and went up to Maíre’s room and blessed her and prayed to the Holy Spirit to watch over her and protect her. All day long I had this dread that she was going to be shot. It seemed an unlikely thing to happen as she wouldn’t be anywhere that there was trouble. I prayed constantly asking and pleading with tThe Holy Spirit to protect her and to keep her safe.
Usually on a Sunday evening Maire went to a children’s disco with friends; her father helped run the disco which was held in the Felons’ Club on the Andersonstown Road. She was allowed to go on the understanding that she would come home with her father. Unfortunately she went off with her friends, one of whom lived in Lenadoon, and it was here at the foot of Lenadoon as she was talking to her friend that an RUC man aimed his plastic bullet gun at the back of her head and fired; as he did so he laughed, which caused Maíre to turn her head around to see who was laughing. According to the doctor this saved her life, she got the full impact of the plastic bullet in the mouth instead of the back of her head. It is my belief that through The Holy Spirit my daughter’s life was saved.
Below are some prayers I have composed to the Holy Spirit; I hope they will be of some help to anyone like myself who struggles at times to say the right words in prayer.
Resentment
In confession once I told the priest about the resentment I felt towards people who had hurt me deeply. This resentment had caused me to lose my peace of mind, which I found unbearable. What the priest said to me was such wonderful advice and it immediately filled me with sadness and the realisation that I had let others destroy something as sacred as my peace of mind. The priest’s words were: “God is standing beside you, he knows you want to rid yourself of all this hurt and resentment, now take them all, gather them up and hand them over to Him, for He is standing there waiting, and let Him do with them what He will, then go in peace”. I silently wept, and physically felt myself hand all these terrible bad feelings over to Almighty God and the weight of them all just lifted, returning to me my peace of mind. But I have to say that I’m human and of course I still at times feel certain resentment towards some people but I don’t let those feelings fester, I sit quietly in God’s presence wherever I may be at the time and hand them over and free myself of the burden and pain that resentment inflicts on sad souls.
Strangely, another way of keeping thoughts and feelings of resentment at bay came to me and I can only imagine it’s from God and this is it: when resentment tries to slip back into my mind I hear an inner voice saying ‘Shhhhhh’ and that seems to be a good way of keeping such thoughts at bay when I feel them coming back to torment me. I even say Shhhhh out loud to myself if I’m thinking something unkind about someone. So it seems it’s a good habit to practice. Shhhhh!
Holy Spirit, I pray that you will direct any resentment that interferes in my relationship with God and my peace of mind, away from me and into the hands of Our Father to do with it what he will. Amen
Prayer 1
Holy Spirit, open my eyes so I can see clearly the path that is right for me at this stage of my journey. Show me how best to work as this new day begins, then to rest as this day ends. Let not the troubles that may befall me keep me from my sleep. Show me, Dear Holy Spirit, when to listen and when to speak; when to laugh, when to hold someone’s hand and when to let someone hold my hand. Tell me how and when to let go, when to give and when to take, when to trust wholeheartedly like a child; show me how to be cautious, show me most of all how to love as God would want me to love. Most Holy Spirit, I trust in thee.
Holy Spirit, give me the confidence to believe in myself. Amen
Prayer 2
Holy Spirit, open my eyes so I can see clearly the damage I do by not trying to forgive those who have hurt me. Help me when I can’t forget, remind me that God Our Father said, “When I forgive, I forget”. Make me aware that I am a sinner and will always need forgiveness from God Almighty. How can I expect to be forgiven if I don’t forgive. Help me to try harder to forgive and to forget. It is important that I should accept that, even if I do forgive, I may not forget; so please help me and show me the way to forgiveness and the recognition that I am no different from any other human being who needs forgiveness and who hopes that others will forgive and forget.
Holy Spirit, pray for me that I will never refuse the hand of friendship from anyone who I believe has harmed me. Amen
Prayer 3
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray that you will guide, protect and lead all those I love and all who mean anything to me safely home this night. If anyone I love should stray into company that does not care about them, please, Dearest Holy Spirit, surround them with your love, insulate them from being hurt. Lead all I care about safely home this night.
Holy Spirit I pray for all those who are lost or are about to become lost. Please guide and protect them. Amen
Prayer 4
Dear Holy Spirit, as I lie awake this night unable to sleep, help my thoughts to be good thoughts and not troubled thoughts that rot the peace that is your gift to me. Sometimes I don’t appreciate how wonderful the gift of ‘peace of mind’ is, until I lose it. Sometimes our peace is taken by events that are beyond our control, and other times we lose it through our own actions. Help us all, Dear Holy Spirit, to understand and acknowledge the cause of losing our peace of mind. Help all who at this moment are preoccupied in plotting revenge, even if it goes no further than their mind; overwhelm them with your peace and teach us all how to let go of hurts and jealousies. Holy Spirit, if I harbour resentment for any reason, then I become a lesser person than I was before. No one else may ever know this except myself and God. So I now gather all the resentments, jealousies and vengeful thoughts that I have stored and locked away until now, and I hand them all over to you to do with them what I can not do by myself, no matter how hard I tried. Free me from all these thoughts that wound My Lord and destroy the real person that I am.
Holy Spirit, I pray for all those who can’t forgive. Amen
Prayer 5
Holy Spirit, as I lie here in my bed this morning, fill my heart with the will to get up and face this new day. This new day is a new start. Yesterday is gone. Anything that happened yesterday is done, it can’t be retrieved or changed, undone or unsaid. Help me to accept and understand that the past is the past. If there is anything I can change that needs to be changed or put right or made better that is within my power, help me to at least to try; help me to accept what I can not change, show me how to deal with the consequences of things I wish I hadn’t done or said; but most of all, Dear Holy Spirit, open my eyes to the gift that being alive this day brings. Help me to realize that this day was made for me, not me alone, but me as an equally loved human being in God’s creation. I pray, Holy Spirit, for all those whose bed is their refuge this day. Please, Dear Holy Spirit, help them face whatever it is they can’t face, whether it is something real or only real in their mind.
Holy Spirit I pray for all those who can’t pray for themselves. Amen
Prayer 6
Holy Spirit, the heat is on, the house is warm, warm water to get washed with but most of all, love, that keeps me warm inside. I know how lucky I am. Dear Holy Spirit, let me never forget those less fortunate than myself. I know many children will be getting up to a cold house where there is no heating and no love, just trouble and insecurities. I pray to you for hope and a feeling of belonging for all children who suffer neglect, abuse — be it sexual or emotional or both — in their own home.
Holy Spirit, I pray for anyone who is afraid; for fear is a lonely and terrible place to be. Amen.
Prayer 7
Dear Holy Spirit, I am afraid. I am afraid to go on living. Please take this fear from me, make it leave me alone, throw it into the ocean where it can be diluted and made powerless. Help me to know and understand and believe in your love, so I will not feel so alone that fear can make me doubt your love for me. It’s so hard when I cannot see or hear you. I’m talking to you now although I can’t see or hear you, but I have a small piece of faith at this moment that you are here with me. Maybe I’ll survive this, but you know there are times when the fear drives my faith in you away. Help me please, Dear Holy Spirit, to keep faith and to trust in you. Holy Spirit, I pray for all those who will let go this night and allow fear to send them to lonely places no human being should have to visit. Please, Dear Holy Spirit, send hope and take away fear from all lonely hearts.
Holy Spirit, I pray for all those near to or in despair, that you will guide them to a safe place. Amen
Prayer 8
Dear Holy Spirit, this has been a remarkable day. There seemed little hope of my vindication. The malicious lies and half truths and innuendo against me could have destroyed me and those I love. When I woke this morning, I believed everything was going to get worse; I couldn’t pray last night, I felt so weak and frightened; but now it’s over, I pray to you to guide those who lied about me to recognise the seriousness of their words. I know, Dear Holy Spirit, that they really didn’t understand the consequences of their actions, so please help and guide them and let the past 24 hours be a lesson that will do them some good. Help me, Dear Holy Spirit, not to judge others.
Holy Spirit, please, please help us all to think before we speak. Amen
Prayer 9
Holy Spirit, today is the first day of school for many children. I remember what it was like when each of my children started school for the first time. It was a mixture of sadness, hope and pride. Sadness because it meant I was handing my child over to someone I didn’t know and who didn’t love them the way I did, naturally enough. Like most mothers, I knew that I wouldn’t be there if they were hurt or told off or rejected by other children. Dear Holy Spirit, I want to pray for all children who will be starting school today for the first time. I ask you to guide them and help them to like school, to see their teacher as a friend and the other pupils as equals. Please help them to learn what is right and what is wrong, how to share and show respect to one another. Dear Holy Spirit, please help any child who goes to school hungry, cold and or unloved. Please help the child who will be different, who will never really fit in and who will feel it.
Holy Spirit, please guide and enlighten all children who fear school.
Prayer 10
Holy Spirit, at times it’s difficult to know if life has been well spent or if it’s been wasted. Sometimes I feel like I’ve wasted so much of my time. There are things I’m good at and things I just shouldn’t have ever bothered with, things that have brought me down and wasted so much of my time. I didn’t always see time as a gift, I am here and time is a part of the present. I didn’t get time past or time to come as the same as time present. All time is a gift and a process of movement. There is nothing I can hold on to or keep, except in my mind. Time always seems to be something I have to spend, (like money) to get through to look back on or to look forward to or to dread, instead of just being happy to enjoy. When I realised that time (my time) was a gift, I thought that at least I wouldn’t lie on my death bed and feel I had wasted my time, but that was naive because if I were to be told today that I’d two weeks or six months to live, I know in my heart that so much of my time has been wasted instead of valued and used wisely. Dear Holy Spirit, help me to appreciate my time daily; because we only get daily measures; tomorrow is promised to no one. Help me to put behind me all that hinders me physically and spiritually, all that stumps my growth as a human being, and all that makes me afraid. Help me, please.
Holy Spirit, help all souls who are afraid to be themselves.
Prayer 11
Holy Spirit, I’ve money in my purse and I’m happy to be able to state that. For many years I neither had nor needed a purse. I know what it’s like to be dependent on others for kindness. Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for all those who are cold because they can’t afford to heat their home or can’t choose what they would like for dinner; but rather eat only what they can afford. Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for all children who don’t know what it’s like to get into a warm bed or wake up to a warm house and breakfast. (I know many kids don’t eat a breakfast nowadays but you know what I mean.) Also, I pray to you to comfort all those who don’t have the security of a home and all that that brings. Dear Holy Spirit, help me always to be grateful for what I have; help me never to take it for granted. Thank you, Dear Holy Spirit.
Holy Spirit, help all those in debt and who just can’t make ends meet.
Prayer 12
Holy Spirit, you know sometimes (maybe a lot of times) when I both want to and need to pray, I can’t. It’s like a block: my mind just won’t go beyond the block and I feel helpless. I pray and ask God to help me pray, I pray to St. Pio to help me pray, and now I’m asking you to help me pray in a way that I know God understands, I know God understands everything but how silly sometimes the human mind can be. Please, Dear Holy Spirit, help me to pray like the river I played at in my childhood that seemed everlasting and never ceased to flow towards the ocean.
Holy Spirit, help me to understand better my need to pray.
Prayer 13
Holy Spirit, you know all things and all people; you know our true motives for everything we do. When we are accused in the wrong, it is of comfort to know that you know our motives for doing or saying certain things that have come out wrong or have been received by the other person in a way we hadn’t intended. When we don’t set out to hurt someone deliberately but they do appear to be hurt, then help us to put things right. Some people will always only believe what they want to believe. I pray to you, Dear Holy Spirit, to enlighten us all to the feelings and sensitivities of others, especial those whom we would regard as friends. Help us to love our friends and cherish friendships. When friends fall out, sometimes things cannot be mended and situations thereafter will never be the same. Help us all, Dear Holy Spirit, to forgive and forget. Teach us to put pride aside and to understand how frail the human heart is when friendships are lost.
Holy Spirit, I pray for anyone who has never known true friendship.
Prayer 14
Holy Spirit, sometimes we can forgive others so much and yet find it so hard or even impossible to forgive ourselves. It is not a bad thing to remember what we are capable of at times, but when it stops our growth and development as a person, then torturing ourselves about the past isn’t healthy for us in any way. Holy Spirit, help me to keep a realistic outlook on my past mistakes; prevent me from stumbling over the past and to keep moving forward with forgiveness and a bit of compassion for myself.
Holy Spirit, help me to keep faith in God’s love and mercy for us all.
Prayer 15
Holy Spirit, springtime is here and soon the smell of cut grass will refresh our senses and remind us that the cycle of life is continuous. In winter, the plants of the earth appear to die only to be reborn in spring and then bloom again in summer. From autumn on, the trees shed their dead leaves; they stand naked for all to see; then, come summer, new growth appears and the trees come alive again. Life has been restored. It is the same with us: our soul outlives our human form in order to rejoin God in completeness, our earth body having served the purpose for which God designed it. No matter what happens in our lives, no matter what or who we lose, life is still everywhere and it won’t stop or end because we want it to, or because we don’t see the point to anything anymore. We can’t stop the flowers from blooming or the sun from shining; but when we lose someone we love, then life is changed forever, and nothing can ever be the way it was. Holy Spirit, many people feel when they suffer the loss of someone they love or depended on, that they won’t be able to survive without that person, and sometimes some people go to their grave with a broken heart caused by the death of a loved one. Holy Spirit, there are many people who feel they can’t go on because of the death of some one they loved, feeling a part of them has died and that life can never again be lived as before; or that life for them is not worth living at all. So, Holy Spirit, I pray for the gentleness of God’s love to surround and protect all those who suffer loss and console all the broken hearted, gently leading them to a place in their soul where they can find peace and the will to live and cherish their own life for its unique worth in God’s love.
Holy Spirit, please help all the broken hearted who feel they can’t go on to accept their loss and to find a way to live with it.
Prayer 16
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray at this moment for all those who have or are about to have a miscarriage. The loss of a precious life that you cherish and carry within you regardless of for how long, is of immeasurable grief and lasts, in reality for some of us, a lifetime. Twenty two years ago, I was 16 weeks pregnant with Martin and Aódhan when they just stopped living (that’s the term the doctor used) and even now I still think about them and what might have been. The longing for them hasn’t decreased; I still fill up and wish they were here. But there have been times in the past when I’ve felt them close, felt them near and I’ve reached out to them and believed they held my hand, though I didn’t feel their touch physically but somehow knew they were there. They are with God and that alone is my joy. Holy Spirit, please comfort anyone who feels alone in their miscarriage and can’t find a way to cope. Many have endured the pain of miscarriage more than once; but hope is a wonderful thing if we have it. We have to go forward otherwise we are at risk of losing what we already have. Our own life don’t just affect us, it affects all those we love and hold dear.
Holy Spirit, please help all those who have lost their baby through miscarriage to accept and not to lose hope; I pray for those who have no one to support them or to understand their loss. I pray they will find comfort in knowing that their baby is with God and his angels.
Prayer 17
Holy Spirit, many people are in deep pain because of their sexual orientation. In the past, older people endured shame, pain and fear, both in silence and denial; surely that cannot be in God’s plan for any human being. Now in the 21st century, many of our young people cannot take the silence of despair that ‘being different brings’. They need guidance and support to ease the confusion and dilemma they face because they are drawn sexually to members of their own sex. They seek an acceptance that may accord them to live a life of fulfilment that is in God’s plan for us all. Dear Holy Spirit, help us all to love, to love.
It is interesting to note that in the Old Testament the word spirit is feminine and Isaiah refers to God as a “mother” (Isaiah 66:13) St. Jerome translated the Old Testament (from Hebrew) and the New Testament (from Greek) into Latin in the 4th century. The only word available to him for “spirit” was the masculine word “spiritus”; but he was clear that this didn’t mean that the Holy Spirit had to be looked upon exclusively as a “He”. In divinity, there is no gender; and in real love for another human being, for some also there is no gender. Dear Holy Spirit, please guide all those who are afraid of their feelings for another person of the same sex, put yourself into their mind so they will call on you for help if they should fall into despair because of who they think they are.
Dear Holy Spirit, please help all those who are lonely and feel they don’t belong.
Prayer 18
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for anyone and everyone for whom nothing ever seems to go right: they get one blow after the other and end up not being able to take even the ordinary knocks that we all get from time to time and their life is marred by doomed expectations. Even when good things come their way, they wait for it to go wrong and thus never enjoy what they have. Holy Spirit, please help all those who don’t expect anything good to happen to them. Please somehow let them know that God’s love for each of us is unique and eternal. God’s love for us all cannot be measured by anything in this world: bad things can happen to anyone at any time; but God’s love happens to us every moment of every day, though we don’t always feel it because we’re so bogged down by the things of this world. Please help all those who have given up hope.
Dear Holy Spirit, I ask for a miracle for anyone reading this that has no hope.
Prayer 19
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for any girl who at this time is contemplating having an abortion. If someone is thinking about aborting their baby, for whatever reason, then they are already in so much pain that they perhaps feel this is their only option. Holy Spirit, please help their situation, whatever it is, to change, to get better. Help them to be strong enough to go through with their pregnancy before making the decision about the future of their baby.
Dear Holy Spirit, please help anyone who feels abortion is the only way to end their problem.
Prayer 20
Holy Spirit, I pray for all children and young adults who have no friends. Sometime if a person is friendless they compromise themselves by going around with others (who aren’t bad) but who are not good for them and in whose company they will not grow as an individual with a will and outlook of their own, but who will do anything to keep friends even if it’s against their nature. Many mothers and grandmothers will understand exactly what I mean. I pray for all young people who are truly lonely and can’t find suitable friends to go around with. I pray for all the young who are without friends, that they will realise that it is better to wait for true friendship to come than to sell themselves short with false friends.
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for all parents and grandparents who feel hurt because their child has no friends or because their child is being led astray by false friends. My prayer is that they will never give up on the child or on You, Dear Holy Spirit…
Prayer 21
Holy Spirit, I pray for all parents who have lost a child or children. Age and circumstances are varied and also irrelevant to the devastation and pain felt by grieving families. For some the loss may be recent and for others many years ago, time doesn’t seem to matter. Ena lost Jim when he was 6 years old 35 years ago playing in front of her in the garden and she told me the full impact of his death only hit her when the troubles ended. Her wound is still opened and raw. Dear Holy Spirit, I pray to you for all those who have suffered the loss a child or children; I pray you will protect and guide all who have suffered in this way to a place of peace within themselves.
Dear Holy Spirit, I pray for all parents who grieve the loss of a child.
Prayer 22
Holy Spirit, I pray for all parents who have no peace because of their children. I pray that parents will come to know and love you and that through you they may find the peace they seek.
Dear Holy Spirit I pray for all broken families.
Through these 22 short prayers to The Holy Spirit it is my hope that somehow they will encourage someone to have faith in and keep faith with The Holy Spirit and find in Him their best friend. I hope I have pleased Him in this small way.
With love,
Roseleen xo
ROSELEEN WALSH 