The frustrated Ghanaian prays to God:
I bless you Father Almighty for giving me a land called Ghana. I glorify your name for the fresh air that I breathe every day. I worship you for the beautiful people you have grown on my motherland, who walk about and chatter and worry about things that are will pass away soon. I glorify your name for of all life past and present.
Compassionate Father, in great awesomeness, I wake up every day contemplating your grandeur and the mystery of man, this living being you made and put on two feet to wander about the earth. We have rejected your rule in past and chose to have our own leaders when Israel your chosen nation of old, rebelled for the umpteenth time against you. You gave them King Saul but later rejected him and anointed David, your King. Good as it seems to us today and by your own accord, you have granted us and helped us to evolve human institutions that chose our kings, rulers and legates of all kinds, times and peoples. For this, I pray today that you bless all rulers and authorities that direct the affairs of your sons and daughters all over the world. Gracious Father, by sons and daughters, I mean all those who acknowledge you as Father and yearn for your love. Bless them all. And let all their actions of every day be inspired by your love through Jesus the Christ.
I commit Ghana in a special way into your hands. This is a Country we believe you have blessed right from the beginning when you started gathering the peoples of all tribes who should populate it one day and make it what it is today: Ghana, the land of great hospitality but also latently dotted with quite a great number of moderate to extreme xenophobes; Ghana, the peaceful country which has never experienced any civil war but which in times of peace, nurtures and spurts out savage desires of brute and gory acts on her children made manifest in the murders and political assassinations of years past, road accidents, armed robberies, and little fights over bread and butter; Ghana, the land of freedom but also with irresponsible people by their daily conduct in leadership and in private homes; Ghana, the land of justice but largely corrupted by money moguls who buy justice and sell it to the dogs, serial criminals and unconscionable souls! It is against these and other seemingly destructive acts and situations that could befall this nation that I pray. Holy Mary! Mother of God, kindly carry us along in your intercessions.
Father in Heaven, bless all of our leadership and infuse them with a sense of duty, courage in front of threats and political intimidations when they must achieve the social good, the common good. "O Lord, you are just, and your judgments right" (Psalms 119, 137). Bless our judges from the lower Courts to the higher Courts, and the Supreme Court, who must not temper with justice but must dispense it with impartiality and with great fear of you, our saving justice. Be thou their judge. Should they ever consider in their hearts to be little gods deciding the fate of the many brought before them for justice, please bring judgment upon them just as you did to the gods of Egypt who could not stand the strength of your arms, for your "sons went about without security, crushed in court without a defender" (Job 5, 4).
Reward the impartial, fearless but compassionate judge and blot out the mind and heart of they that refuse to acknowledge you in their duty of dispensing justice, for "It is not good to give consideration to the wicked or to harm the virtuous when giving judgment" (Prov. 18, 5).
Bless our lawyers and lead their hearts towards your love and that of fellow man. Kindly teach them that extorting money unnecessarily from the poor, the jobless, the defenceless and the abandoned thereby making it almost impossible for them to access justice when these must have justice done unto them is killing their hope in you O Father all-compassionate. Please reassure these unfortunate brothers and sisters in detention, both guilty and non-guilty alike that ‘All bribery, all injustice will disappear but [their] good faith will last forever" (Sirach, 40, 12), so says your word.
Teach the teacher to teach well our children so they can grow up in your fear and with strong moral character. Let those teachers who extort money from school children and their parents under the guise of extra classes lose their mind, for they see no good use of it in the classroom. Punish those teachers who lust after the little school girls and boys and corrupt the minds of these innocent and gracious ones. Please get their manhood swollen with oil from the Jubilee Fields.
Strengthen the arms and feet of our policemen and women, our arms-bearing uniformed men and women, who all stand day and night on their feet, guiding traffic, trotting the dark corners and alleys of our streets in detection and prevention of crime, patrolling the jungles along our borders in deterring both internal and external aggressors. Reward them abundantly for they sacrifice their lives and families to protect and defend us, your people. Through promotions, special state awards, and many other good things of your choice, reward them Father, and let their examples of honesty, dedication to service and truthfulness inspire many a youth, to offer to serve mother Ghana. Be thou their shield and defence against the aggressor. May your peace be within our walls and your security within our citadels! (cf. Ps 122, 7). But punish the corrupt, the extortionist, and all those who without cause detain innocent persons, travellers, and drivers in police cells for petty offences only to cause them or their relatives to come and pay something for their release. Let your anger destroy and render useless, and in good faith, all properties they have acquired through patapaa, stolen monies, and dishonesty. Spare us O God, the dangers from this masquerading sense of protection and security from our security services, which is alien to your sense of justice.
To be continued
