Daring to Say the 
Our Father

Christ Himself taught us in prayer
Call God our Father, and so I dare
Claim kinship I’d not else presume,
Sin-soiled from my mother’s womb.
But then He urged us further pray
Words that I’m afraid to say.
When I ask Thy will be done
I think of Abraham and his son
And Jesus in His agony.
Might God will as much of me?
Forgive our debts as we forgive
I fear to ask when I let live
Resentment for remembered slight;
Do I waive mercy by this blight?
And yet I pray, and add this plea:
Thy Kingdom reign today in me.

—James F. O’Callaghan