Nuclear Prayer Day - August 6, 2023

You are invited – you, your group, your congregation, and your organization - to join with others around the world on August 6th to say a prayer about nuclear weapons. For the second straight year we will say prayers as a global community on this day.   One year later, the threats of first use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine still remain, and the potential for capricious escalation stir us in the deepest parts of our souls, and inspire us to pray that this planet might be saved from the more than 13,000 warheads which are aimed and  ready!    What kind of nuclear prayer? You are invited to create your own – a prayer, an intention, a meditation, about hope, or regret (that these weapons exist), or anything else that comes to your heart. Our group, Voices for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons, has begun our monthly meetings for 15 years praying the same nuclear prayer. Perhaps THIS prayer of ours might help stimulate your own prayer.   People of our group who have said this prayer include a former Secretary of State, George Shultz; a former Secretary of Defense, William Perry; a former Ambassador Thomas Graham; physicist Sidney Drell; international lawyer Jonathan Granoff; and several others. These are people who have devoted their lives to disarmament and the abolition of nuclear weapons. People of action – and also people of prayer!

Why pray?

1. When people all over the world join together on one day to raise their deepest concerns to the Highest Power, then hope and solidarity replace the feeling of nuclear helplessness;

2. It stops us from thinking that nine nuclear-powered presidents are the final authorities of life on this planet;

3. It sets us in search of leaders who will deliver us from nuclear self-destruction.

Hundreds of people around the world joined us in prayer last year. We already have pledges from people worldwide who will be making their nuclear prayers on August 6th this year too; a global community of prayer has already begun. We hope that you will join us and them. If you do, please let us know by clicking the "Yes, I'll pray too" button below, so that an ever greater number of such prayers can be recognized, celebrated, and grow in strength.

Why a Nuclear Prayer?

Any prayer centering on nuclear weapons drives us to the Beginning and the End of life on this planet, to recognize the fleeting and fragile nature of life, and to own our obligation to secure a future habitat for our own and other species. A nuclear prayer from the depths of our souls is a bold action of hope as well as a prelude to earth-saving labors.

More information about special prayer events to be held on August 6,2023 will be shared closer to the date.