Prayer Requests

Readers write:

Would you and your readers please pray for my marriage? While we were dating, my wife stated that she didn’t want children. I told her children were non-negotiable for me, and she changed her mind before we got married. We now have a 2 y.o. and another on the way. She recently told me that she regrets having children and resents me for insisting on having them. She stopped wearing her wedding ring two weeks ago.

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Could Lucy please ask the grownups who read your blog to pray for my dear friend Lauren who could be facing a second bout with cancer? Lauren is a grandma herself, and God willing, we would like to have her around for many years to enjoy her grandkids (not as cute as Lucy, of course, but close). Lauren is the kind of person who is there with support and encouragement for everyone else, but keeps her own burdens and struggles to herself. She has helped me through difficult and painful things in the past, and I would like to return the favor if I can.

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And finally, Perry Lorenzo, who is one of Seattle treasures both as a Catholic and as a fine teacher on practically everything to do with the Western tradition, but especially opera and the Catholic faith, writes:

Dear friends in the Lord,

I have a degenerative bone cancer in my left shoulder, as well as dormant cancers in all my lung lobes. I am going through radiation and MRIs and tests and scans at present, and soon we will be determining a future path of treatment.

This has not in the least diminished my faith, in fact only strengthened it. My prayer is that God heal me so that I can return to performing my vocation of education and teaching and music; if God will not at present quickly heal me, I pray that I can give the best witness of love, gift, and beauty to other people. In the spirit of Pope John Paul II. Please pray for me in that way, if you wish: or in any way you like…

I think that this experience of cancer, medicine, and treatment is quite profound. It does not at all alter what we all already know about ourselves–that we are created by God, that as creatures we are limited and dependent and mortal, that suffering is inevitable, and that we will die. These are all facts, whether we are diagnosed with a disease or not. However, the experience of a cancer, such as I am now going through, is simply an intensification of my awareness of this fact. I know, in a deep way, that I am created, mortal, and live every day in the face of death. The real issue is the how of facing death: and I need your prayers to face death–or serious illness and recovery–in a spirit of faith, hope, love, joy, gratitude, and most of all GIFT. God has given me my life, and I want to give it all back to Him, for it is His anyways; in giving it all to Him, I want to love Him and love my neighbor, to return to my vocation or to use what time is remaining as a Gift of sharing God’s beauty with other people.

I keep a long list of people to pray for daily, as Im sure many of you do too! Please keep me in your prayers!

If you would like to pray to the Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman, please do so. Newman inspires me to be a Christian Roman Catholic intellectual in the modern world, dedicated to education and the Gospel. Blessed John Henry Newman, pray for me.

Thank you,

Perry Lorenzo.

Lord, hear our prayer. And I ask especially through our Lord Jesus that you would hear and honor the prayer of faith of your servant and son Perry, who is such a gift to all of us here in Seattle. Mother Mary, pray for these and all your children.