Today, Thursday, I had the privilege of offering the following invocation for the 36th Annual AFL-CIO Community Services Conference:
Gracious God, it is a privilege together in these days to celebrate the partnership between organized labor and the United Way. We ask for your blessing upon us for we need strong partnerships to build strong communities. We need powerful partnerships to create and defend good schools, good jobs and healthy families.
We give special thanks today, Lord, for sisters and brothers who model the Golden Rule and generously give of themselves to help our neighbors in need. They inspire us to look into each other’s eyes with hope. Bless, O Lord, all for whom solidarity is a way of life.
In these days, Lord, as we meet here, we keep in our prayers sisters and brothers in low-wage jobs who fight for justice, and we give thanks for leaders in communities across America who work for the common good and higher minimum wages.
We pray that you will anoint the speakers who come to share with us, that in this time we can be about the work of building a movement to bring liberty and justice for all. Amen.