Please pray for my week in DC and at the National Prayer Breakfast

I write to ask your prayers and/or good wishes to support me in a week ahead that is important for me, and I want to be able to offer and realize the best possible.

By the grace and kindness of friends and supporters, once again I have the blessing to spend the week in Washington DC invited by the Congressional Host Committee, and the co-chairs of the National Prayer Breakfast. It is now in its 66th year.

Every single Thursday early morning throughout every year for decades, members of Congress and their guests gather for one hour of prayer for the nation and the world, and for one another. This is a fascinating reality that lies deep beneath the normal ugliness of US political life. During this one hour a week, people of faith (originally Christian, but now members of every faith) gather under the strictest and most carefully respected rule that this hour is one of love and compassion. Absolutely no politics may be part of their time together.

On (usually the first, but this year the second) Thursday of February each year, this prayer group invites the President of the United States to attend. The President used to simply come to that prayer meeting. Over the years this has expanded to become a major international event with top religious

leaders from all religions, from all over the world. They come for a week to meet one another, work together, and to pray for America, to help it realize more and more its proper role as a servant in the world.

The breakfast itself is on Thursday morning, but all through the week there are meetings, gatherings, both public and private, which remarkably manage, even among 1000s to keep the rule, that in this place, there is NO politics, but just humbly seeking the divine in our lives and for the people we know and work with.

I am always greatly moved by the chance to be in such a place, and I take the opportunity deeply seriously. Because I want to do as well as possible, I write you now to ask your prayers and/or good wishes for me, and for all of us who will try this week to be good and realize good for a more just and peaceful world

Thank you for allowing this brief request and intrusion