Interfaith Responses to the Coronavirus Pandemic
This video, “Be the Light,” was sent to us by our Buddhist friends at Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights to share through our website. It was created by the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Community.
Be a Warrior for the Light
WEEKLY LIVE BROADCAST OF PRAYERS FOR THE WORLD
Live Broadcast
When: Every Thursday from March 26 to September 24
Time: 8:00 am PDT — 5:00 pm CEST — 7:30 pm IST
What is it?: 20 minutes of coming together to strengthen light in the world — with a brief talk and meditation followed by group affirmation and visualization for world blessing.
Everyone is welcome: Please share the event with anyone. Together, we can help to bring light and healing into the world.
Healing Affirmations of the World
God’s light is within me and around me. With the sword of faith in my hand, with the love of God in my heart, I am a warrior of light. I join my brothers and sisters everywhere to overcome fear with faith, hatred with love, and disease with health. Let us fill the world with God’s light.
A formal statement and gathering of prayers across faiths from
the National Council of Churches.
One in Spirit, One in Mind, One in Heart
Scriptures and Prayers shared among Interfaith Dialogue Partners and Friends in a Time of Trial
The National Council of Churches is blessed to have friends and colleagues from many religious traditions. These friendships are part of our lives at all levels of the organization, from denominational and congregational leadership to faculty and community partnerships. Among these relationships, the NCC is grateful to have the friendship of interfaith dialogue partners. The NCC has national dialogues with the Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, and Sikh communities. In these dialogues, we learn about each other’s faiths, discuss issues that affect our communities, and strive to build the kinds of relationships where we can talk with, and even on behalf of, each other in moments of crisis or distress.
Today, as the entire country, and indeed the entire world, faces the coronavirus pandemic, we draw upon our shared convictions to help sustain each other, and our neighbors. We do so as friends in dialogue who, though we cannot meet in person during these days, still meet heart-to-heart, and in our thoughts and prayers. We may be standing alone, but we are nonetheless standing together.
And so, as dialogue partners whose relationships transcend the physical distancing necessary to lessen the devastation wrought by this disease, we offer these scriptures and prayers from each of our traditions, for one another, and for the world. We do so, not as the interfaith community writ large, not in place of the many interfaith coalitions that beautifully bring multiple voices together, but as friends from different communities who are one in spirit, one in mind, and one in heart. May all be blessed by these scriptures and prayers, and with the divine protection and healing that they convey.
Co-convening organizations of these dialogues:
National Council of Churches USA; Fo Guang Shan Hsi Lai Temple; Vedanta Society of Southern California; National Council of Synagogues; United States Council of Muslim Organizations; Sikh Council for Interfaith Relations; The Guibord Center – Religion Inside Out
From the Christian Tradition
Scripture O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to all the generations to come. Your power and your righteousness, O God, reach the...
From the Sikh Tradition
Scripture The world is in flames, shower it with your mercy Save it by any means that can save itThe everlasting Guru has provided relief through the everlasting WordO Nanak! There is none else so merciful and benevolent. (Siri Guru Granth Sahib, p. 853) Prayer The...
From the Muslim Tradition
Scripture And, most surely, We shall test all of you believers with something of fear and with hunger and with loss of wealth and life and crops. So give glad tidings of everlasting delight in Paradise to those who are enduringly patient – those who when an affliction...
From the Jewish Tradition
Scripture Heal me, O LORD, and let me be healed…For You are my glory. (Jeremiah 17:14) Prayer Avinu Malkeinu, Dear God in Heaven, protect our families, our friends and our neighbors as we negotiate these troubled seas in which we find ourselves afloat. Ever mindful of...
From the Hindu Tradition
Scripture The knowing Self is not born, It does not die. It has not sprung from anything; nothing has sprung from It. Birthless, eternal, everlasting, and ancient, It is not killed when the body is killed. (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 1.2.18) Therefore, at all times, constantly...
From the Buddhist Tradition
Scripture The Buddha said “if there be countless hundreds of thousands of living beings experiencing all manner of suffering, who hear of Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva and call his name with single-minded effort, then Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva will instantly observe the...