We’re delighted to welcome a new writer to the Deacon blog, Sister Margaret-Thomas, an Anglican Benedictine and a sacramental and liturgical theologian. She is exploring the distinctive diaconate.
This litany of hers is deeply diaconal, as our ordinal calls us to ‘reach into the forgotten corners of the world, that the love of God may be made visible’.
Some holiness never stands in a pulpit.
Some holiness never makes a speech.
Some holiness is in the things no one sees — the small prayers, the unnoticed kindness, the secret struggle to stay soft in a hard world.
Tonight, we pray for the small and hidden:
- For the one who sends a text just to say thinking of you,
Lord, bless their unseen care. - For the student who keeps showing up even when no one cheers,
Lord, bless their quiet perseverance. - For the carer whose days blur together, unseen and unpaid,
Lord, bless their faithfulness. - For the neighbor who clears the snow, picks up the litter, waters the flowers — just because,
Lord, bless their silent service. - For the friend who holds back their own grief to sit beside another’s sorrow,
Lord, bless their compassion. - For the person who prays in the night when no one else knows they’re awake,
Lord, bless their vigil. - For the one who forgives again without ever being thanked,
Lord, bless their mercy. - For the artist painting in the margins, the writer scribbling lines no one may ever read,
Lord, bless their offering. - For the sick who bear their days with courage hidden from the world,
Lord, bless their endurance. - For the volunteer who sets out chairs, washes cups, folds bulletins, sings harmonies, and never gets a spotlight,
Lord, bless their devotion. - For the soul who wonders if any of it matters,
Lord, whisper: it does.
And for me, when I long to be seen but am called to be hidden,
Lord, teach me that You see. Teach me that it is enough.
The kingdom grows in secret places.
The seeds sown in the dark still rise toward the sun.
The mercy offered in silence still reshapes the world.
So may we walk quietly, bless widely, and love deeply.
And may we trust that what is small is never lost to God.
Amen.
CofE Network of Distinctive Deacons 