But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

— Matthew 5:44

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”  No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

—Romans 12:19-21

In my last post, “Subjected thus”—The President Gets COVID,” I touched on the question of how to pray for the President. Of course we pray in general for all who have been infected by the coronavirus, but regarding specific petitions on the President’s behalf, I wrote: “I will pray that Trump’s time of trial may effect the healing of his soul. If he is going to suffer, may his illness be for him a birth of empathy, compassion, humility and goodness.”

With every passing day, that prayer becomes harder to offer with any conviction. As we witness Trump’s continuing disregard for the safety of others—both those around him and the country at large—we wonder whether he may be past saving. Instead of being humbled by his illness, he has only grown more malicious. The people around him are dropping like flies, and countless Americans will continue to die from his mismanagement. And now we fear that his relentless disparagement of life-saving protocols will kill even more. “Far less lethal!!!” than the flu, he tweets against all evidence. It’s as if he’s shouting to the world, “Hurry up and die!” 

What, then, is our prayer to be for such a man in such a time?

In the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, prayers for the sick don’t ask that the ill simply be restored to their former state so they can resume their story exactly where they left off. While those prayers ask for relief from pain, protection from danger, freedom from fear, the banishment of weakness and the gift of healing, they also propose a life transformed by suffering: 

“… enable him to lead the residue of his life in thy fear, and to thy glory.”

“… that, his health being renewed, he may bless your holy Name.”

“… restore to him your gifts of gladness and strength, and raise him up to a life of service to you.”

“… restored to usefulness in your world with a thankful heart.”

“… that he, daily increasing in bodily strength, and rejoicing in your goodness, may order his life and conduct that hemay always think and do those things that please you.” ^[i]

As for a President and all those in authority, the Prayer Book asks that they be guided by “the spirit of wisdom,” beseeching the “Lord our Governor” to “fill them with the love of truth and righteousness, and make them ever mindful of their calling to serve this people in your fear.”^[ii] Would that it were so! But the way things are going, the prayer “For our Enemies” seems more to the point: 

O God, the Father of all, whose Son commanded us to love our enemies: Lead them and us from prejudice to truth; deliver them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.^[iii]

The “and us” is a critical part of this prayer, because we have all, symptomatic or not, been infected by the Trumpist pandemic of hate and cruelty. If we say we have not had a few hateful thoughts in the past four years, the truth is not in us. Resistance to evil and purity of heart are not soul mates or easygoing partners. They must work hard to stay coupled. 

Another timely prayer is the Collect for the Feast of Holy Innocents, when we remember the children of Bethlehem murdered by King Herod (Matthew 2:13-18). The prayer is not concerned with the state of Herod’s soul, but with the damage inflicted by his successors: 

We remember today, O God, the slaughter of the holy innocents of Bethlehem by King Herod. Receive, we pray, into the arms of your mercy all innocent victims; and by your 
great might frustrate the designs of evil tyrants and establish your rule of justice, love, and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the 
Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.^[iv]

We are all standing in the need of prayer these days. And even though we can never fully understand what prayer is and what prayer does, prayer “without ceasing” is an essential part of the healing of the world and the perfection of our souls. 

Prayer isn’t like online shopping—placing our order and expecting 2^nd-day delivery. It’s not a mechanism for producing outcomes. It’s a relationship, a state of being-with and being-for. It is offering and entrusting ourselves to the One who is “always more ready to hear than we to pray,” who knows “our necessities before we ask and our ignorance in asking.”^[v]

Knowing exactly what to pray for is impossible. We cannot see into the hearts of others, nor can we foresee the future. God only knows what is best. As for our own judgments, perspectives and desires, they can taint the purest prayer. In our essential state of imperfection and unknowing, perhaps the safest petitions are these: “Hold us in your mercy” and “Thy will be done.”

But with regard to more specific petitions for this President, I will be guided by the examples cited from the Book of Common Prayer. I will pray for his suffering to be brief but transformative. I will pray for his power to be guided by wisdom and truth. I will pray that his evil designs be frustrated, and that he (and we) be freed from the grip of hatred, cruelty and revenge. But I must confess that Donald Trump is not easy to pray for.

When I think of the monster who has tortured children in cages and caused countless COVID deaths, I struggle with my anger, my horror, and my disgust. But as I sat in the silence of a moonlit garden before this morning’s dawn, I was given the image of a little boy so damaged, so broken, so unloved, locked deep inside the dungeon of Trump’s psyche seventy years ago—guarded by dragons, hidden from the light, lost to the world. That tragic, wounded, forgotten child is someone I can pray for with my whole heart.

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^[i] The Book of Common Prayer, according to the use of The Episcopal Church USA (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), 458-459.

^[ii] BCP, 820.

^[iii] BCP, 816.

^[iv] BCP, 238.

^[v] BCP, Proper 21 (p. 234) and Proper 11 (p. 231).