Prayer of Saint Chester

May all I do today
begin inside your consenting grace, O Lord.
Plant dreams and hopes
like a flag or a pole in my being,
liven my sad existence:
I’ll be within you today, by God.

May all whom I service today
and you help me, O Lord.
Be at my center
and lie beside me to comfort lost soul:
Be my pillar today, and yea.

May all I am today
be in kind with your not saying no, O sweet gentle Lord.
My thoughts, my work, my life, my healthy sicknesses:
make them permissed of your blessings,
for your kingdom, to teach your flock, your sheep gone lost;
let them go beyond today, I am the shepherd,
O my gracious patient God.

In your name I pray,

Amen

There are many saints for children. Some are even quite famous (ever heard of St. Nicholas, anyone???) There are even the likes of St. Jerome Emiliani, the patron of orphaned children, but not one of the many is quite like Saint Chester, the patron saint of impressionable children (loose translation.)

Modern Understanding

It’s impossible to know what works were done by a man who died hundreds of years ago, and didn’t even speak English, but we do know a little and we can fill in everything we need to, just like he did.

Miracles Performed!

To even get consider for sainthood, you have to perform miracles. There is no public documentation about the works he did to save his fellow man (thanks a lot, Pope!) but we know there were at least some.

Be Generous

If you want to be like St. Chester, you have to give of yourself. You have to see need, take the lead and accept responsibility. If you’re the lady who takes in a stray cat or two, you need to stop saying ‘no’ when people offer you another dozen strays. Saint Chester took in every orphaned boy he could get his fingers on, and he never asked for anything in exchange.

Love children, they are our future because we are their past

If you have a child, or take in a child (or serve in a mentor-type role for a boy,) don’t pretend they are an inconvenience or that you’re just doing your job. You’re doing more than that, and whether or not you know it now, the kids will know it someday in the future and get in touch with you to say thanks a bit, like I did to Father Timothy, whom I’m still not sure I’ve forgiven, but I pray for acceptance daily and soon He will let me have it.

If you’re to love children and help them unto the future, you have to prepare them for adulthood. Strict chores, stern lectures, steadfast study, and other exploits not in keeping with childhood, but right in line with what an adult would do, whatever that may be.

Maybe it’s bringing water from the well or painting a fence you wouldn’t expect him too. Don’t be surprised if these boys don’t willingly participate, and punish them as you must, even if it means taking away food or clothing for a week.

Don’t let laws of man stand between you and your work

If the law of man said you couldn’t teach a child to read, God would forgive you for breaking that law of man, though you’d have to pray to your beads like seldom before. If the laws of your state say you can’t teach, nurture or love that child in ways that you know God has told you is right, you have every right to ignore them. You may go to jail or hell for it, but if you hear His calling and know the word is right in your ear, you can do know wrong, especially when doing so right by Him feels so sensational in His ministry.

When in doubt, pray

There is nothing you can be tempted by, consider, commit, or cover up that the Lord our God won’t help you to understand. When in doubt, don’t be sad; just pray for guidance. That’s how I took my penultimate girlfriend before settling on a life of celibacy, though she was just fifteen and I was almost forty. Don’t worry, God instructed me to be patient, take no impropriety inside her, and I didn’t, to the majestic delight of her parents.

Even though I was not a man of enough faith, and she was just a petite, buxom lass who could be convinced of almost anything, my faith prevailed and I didn’t so much as kiss her, even as much as I might have said that I would have thought about wanting to consider doing something close to it, eventually.

Conclusion

The road to righteousness is paved with broken hearts and forgotten lovers left in the wake of a stern best saved for God’s ministry. I can’t pretend I’ve been perfect, but when it comes to helping out the lost sheep of His herd, I’ve always prayed with an open mind and listed for answers with an open heart, and it’s been the most amazing journey a life could ever beg to enjoy.

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UPDATE: I got a spam abuse notice from my host so I had to stop sending it. Sorry everybody. I know there was over 50 of you guys by the end there. I’m going to talk to the web person from my church and see if she knows another way to send them out. Check back in a couple weeks please!

NOTE TO READERS –

I’ve got a couple of really ugly letters recently, and I won’t name any names, but it seems a rare handful have completely misunderstood the purpose of this site. We don’t advocate or endorse anything but faith in the our Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus born of a virgin womb, crucified to pay the eternal price for our sins, resurrected to live a life unending in Heaven with the Father, God.

A couple letters I’ve got so far yell like we’re telling people to abuse children. What kind of a sick, demented person would think that??? Nothing could be more wrong.

This site only provides information from historical records, and doesn’t pass any judgment on them (judge not lest ye be judged, anybody?)

All we want is to love children as we would love one another, but not in the same way. I’ve taken a personal vow to never “lie with a woman”, and I never have. I’ve also taken a vow to not “lie with a man as one lies with a woman” because “God hates that (or “it’s an abomination,” depending on your version.) But I don’t need Leviticus to tell me right from wrong.

Boys aren’t women, and they aren’t yet men. When they’re lost or forsaken, someone has to love them, and by all that’s holy, I do love children with every part of me.