Does anyone know of any lovely family prayers ?

[mummyloveslucy]

Hi, my daughter is four and a half and goes to a church school, she also goes to church with us most sundays.
When I dropped her to school a bit late the other day, I walked in when they were saying their prayers. The words were so gorgeous, it gave me a worm fuzzy feeling. [soppy mummy] It occured to me that we should pray with our daughter at home, I don't know why we don't already really.
I just want some ideas of family prayers or other childrens prayers with lovely words.
I'd be really greatfull for any suggestions. Thanks.

bump

Ok this is our made up prayer... which can be shortened or extended as the mood takes you ! You have to sing it a sort of silly sing songy type of voice... but DD loves it, paticularly if she's feeling a bit upset it seems to settle her. YOu probably want something a bit more religious but it does us fine!

God Bless Mummy, G B Daddy, G B (insert DD name here) this is our family..

God Bless Granny, G B Grandad, G B Uncle XX and all his friends

God Bless Auntie XX and then list all her family ending with the dog

G B all our friends at nursery .//// list them
GB all our friends at school --- list them
GB all our friends at holiday club....

God Bless all the children in the world we send them all our love.

Aww, that's really sweet. I love the ending.

I still remember my nursery prayer. I was only 5 when I left the nursery.

Maybe I should write my own too. It would make it more special.

Hi MLL - do write your own. If you have a small family you'll be very grateful as it means you don't have too many verses.

I wrote this prayer when I was a single parent but wanted to give DD some sort of sense of family. When I hitched up with DD's stepfather (a devout aetheist) I decided not to include all him or his family otherwise there would be far too many verses.

x

The other traditional family prayer that I remember saying was:

Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord to soul to keep
If I die before I wake
I pray the Lord my soul to take..

I know this prayer dates from the mid 19th Century in the USA. I first found it when I was a kid reading the Laura Ingells Wilder books.

I think if I mentioned the "If I die before I wake" she'd never go to sleep ever again.

I will write my own, we do have a small family.

Hi there, just browsing (should be sleeping!) and only just saw this thread.

We say this with the DCs as a night-time prayer, I suppose it's a sort of more modern version of the "Now I lay me down to sleep":

"God our Father I come to say
Thank you for your love today
Thank you for my family
and all the friends you give to me
Guard me in the dark of night
And in the morning send your light."

There's also a morning prayer:

"O Father in heaven you love me
You're with me night and day
I want to love you always
In all I do and say
I'll try to please you Father
Please bless me through this day."

I wrote a "litany of prayer" for my church, and got a lot out of it. You could perhaps do the same, with your daughter. Litanies seem to start the same on each line.

Mine began "Blessed be...." eg blessed be the flower arrangers, who make the church look so beautiful.

But perhaps for a small child it could be "We thank you God for..." eg "We thank you God for my lovely teacher Mrs X who helps me learn", and build up a list of people/things you thank God for every day.

My lo's always say this before bed.

Gentle Jesus up above send the world lots of love .

See if there's a religious bookshop - some of the board books have nice prayers. DD3 had a book published by Brimac called "God Bless" - though biased to traditional family roles, goes along the lines of:

God Bless Mummy, she looks after us, all day and night-time too
God Bless Daddy, he takes care of us and shoews us what to do
God Bless our home, may everyone keep warm and well inside
God Bless our pets, look after them, should they run off and hide

and more along those lines (don't want to disturb DD3 by nosing in her room)