Reference

Isaiah 40:25-31, Psalm 19, John 1:1-18
Third Sunday after Pentecost

Today is a tremendously special day, with 3 themes: the National Aboriginal Day of Prayer, World Refugee Sunday, and Father's Day! For the National Aboriginal Day of Prayer, our Service incorporates many parts of the Online National Service recorded for this day, with participation from the National Indigenous Archbishop Mark MacDonald, Bishop Sidney Black, Bishop Lydia Mamakwa, and Primate Linda Nicholls. For Father’s Day, our Service has a special Children’s Time song, and the father-son team of Stacy and Freddie Spoonheim leading us in the First Reading and Prayer for Fathers, respectively. For World Refugee Sunday, we are sharing a special prayer remembering the plight of displaced peoples, who total 1% of the world’s population. We continue to pray in response to COVID-19, aware of the particular vulnerability to the disease’s worst effects among those who are excluded from positions of privilege; and we are uniting in a prayer for the elimination of racism. In fact, throughout the entire Service, there is the theme of justice, respect, reconciliation, and healing, as all of us share God’s love with one another, as children of God, and brothers and sisters of one another.