A Mother's Prayer

Dear Lord,

Please let me see these babies with your eyes. Let me see their beauty and their perfection and the immense gift of their presence through your all merciful gaze.

Please let me love them with your heart. Let me accept them in all their humanity -- their strengths and their weaknesses, their beauty and their faults. Let me love them selflessly, fully, divinely.

Let me know them with your mind. Let me grant them a freedom that guides them but lets them choose. Let me remember that true holiness can only come from free will. Help me protect that will just as I strive to protect their souls and their hearts and their innocence and their joy.

Please help me guide them with your hands. Help me always be gentle but firm. Guiding but not directing. Teaching but not demanding.

And let me lead them with your feet. Feet that know the way, that are steady in their path, that lead always to your embrace.

Because I look at these girls, Lord, and I know they deserve more than I can be, more than I am. They are your children, princesses to your King, children of Eternal Love.

I ask that you help me be who You need me to be for them, loving them through this life and towards the eternal. Help me help them be in this world but not of it, examples of your grace and mercy in this world.

I am weak. I am selfish. I fumble. I fail. It is only through your guidance that I can be enough. Please stay by side through this most important journey.

Let me love as you love.