Diocesan Legate Invokes Lincoln, King, at Pre-Inaugral Prayer Service
20 February 2009
During a pre-inauguration prayer service in Washington, DC, last month, Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, Legate of the Eastern Diocese and President of the National Council of Churches, encouraged listeners to find inspiration in the words of America’s 16th President, at a time when “we are troubled by the clouds hanging over our nation, and burdened by the great matters at stake for the future.”
Abraham Lincoln and the Gettysburg Address were remembered in an invocation Archbishop Aykazian delivered to open the “Pre-Inauguration Ecumenical Prayer Service” held on Monday, January 19 at the Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in Washington.
The service, organized by the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, drew more than 100 members of Congress and religious leaders for an afternoon of prayer and reflection. The foundation is a nonprofit organization that works to improve educational and economic opportunities in the African-American community.
Summoning memories of truly dark periods in world history—including the Armenian Genocide, the Holocaust, and the genocide in Darfur— Archbishop Aykazian said that “Our world has endured – and still endures – pain and heartbreak.”
“We pray for the souls lost to such tragic episodes, and for those lost combating the powers of evil,” he said.
“And we pray that they, too, shall not have died in vain,” he added, going on to quote Lincoln’s 1863 address, where the Civil War president called upon survivors to ensure that those who had sacrificed their lives “shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that this government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Returning to the present moment, Archbishop Aykazian said: “Lord, help us to heed the lessons of history, and to recognize your loving presence among all people of goodwill, throughout the world.”
Among those lessons of history was the dream of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr.: “the dream for which he struggled, the dream for which he suffered, and the dream for which he died,” the archbishop prayed.
“Tomorrow we will see the result of his dream coming true,” he said of the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th U.S. President, which would take place the very next day.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who served as the guest preacher at the service, thanked Archbishop Aykazian for participating in the event. Archbishop Tutu spoke of the optimism surrounding Barack Obama’s election, and compared it to the election of Nelson Mandela as president of a unified South Africa. Mandela, also a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, was the first President of his country to be elected in a fully representative democratic election.
Prior to the service, Archbishop Aykazian joined other church leaders at a luncheon, where they spoke about recent ecumenical and interfaith efforts, and the support religious leaders might offer the new presidential administration.
