Bread and Justice

O God, just as the disciples heard Christ's words of promise and began to eat the bread and drink the wine in the suffering of a long remembrance and in the joy of a hope, grant that we may hear your words spoken in each thing of everyday affairs:
Coffee, on our table in the morning;
the simple gesture of opening a door to go out, free;
the shouts of children in the parks;
a fimilar song, sung ny an unfimiliar face;
a friendly tree that has not yet been cut down.
May simple things speak to us of your mercy, and tell us that life can be good.
And may these sacrmental gifts make us remember those who do not recieve them:
Who have their lives cut every day, in the bread absent from the table;
in the door of the hospital, the prison, the welfare homethat does not open;
in sad children, feet without shoes, eyes without hope;
in war hymns that glorify death;
in deserts where once there was life.
Christ was also sacrificed; and may we learn that we participate in the saving sacrifice of Christ when we participate in the suffering of his little ones. Amen.

Rubem Alves, Brazil, 20th cent.
the United Methodist Hymnal pg. 639