Photo prayers

  THE KEY TO LIFE IS CHRIST

    

Family photos can be catalysts for encountering God’s love in new ways.

Meditating with photos creates visual prayers that bring hope, healing and

blessings. Gathering photos of children, parents and grandparents can help

you discover your family's unique spirituality.

Opening Reading: Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the first born of

all creation, for in him were created all things. He is before all things, and in

him all things hold together. Col 1:15,17

Begin with a greeting to God   (example) Holy Creator,

When I look at this photo I …     am...  happy to see your joy on little Billy's face…

     OR I am frightened about what might happen to him...

Thank you or help me prayer     (Describe the situation. When you run out of words give your feelings

     to God, or pray with the titles of Jesus, or use charismatic prayer)  

     But I am also scared of what can happen when he gets sick at                                                                             school. Will the nurse be in that day? Will an ambulance come soon

     enough? Help me place Billy in your arms right now.

Belief statement or psalm verse   The Bible tells us that when we trust in you, you do not abandon us.

Surrender prayer (while you lift up his or her photo in prayer)

     And so I will depend on you, God. You will be there for my child.

End with God      You are my father and Billy's father too. Thank you for listening.

Consider designing your own prayer cards with the photos of people for whom you pray on a regular basis. This can be done by creating columns on a page, inserting mini-scans of closeups, and including a prayer that you find yourself repeating often.

For resources about handing on the faith to grandchildren, neices and nephews visit www.catholicevangelizer.com

                                              Instructions for Family Prayer Cards

                                                   Part A –choosing and preparing photos

     

If you have photos scanned into your computer

                 

1.Open the photo with your photo editing program and crop just the person's head and shoulders to 1 inch by 1.5 inches.

2.Save this BY ANOTHER NAME so you don't lose the original photo file                                                              

           3.   Go to part B

If you do NOT have photos scanned into jpeg files

1.Choose a few photos you want to use. Measure the part of the photo you wan to use. It should be about 1 inch by 1.5 inches. If it is not, you need to magnify or reduce the photo on a copier.

2.Use good quality paper to copy the magnified or reduced photo

3.Cut out the part of the photo that you will put on the prayer card

4.Follow part B except in step 4 where it says insert photo INSTEAD: HIT THE RETURN KEY about 6 times to leave room for your photo on the finished cards

5.Glue the 1 inch by 1.5 inch mini photo to the cards you make

Part B – creating prayer cards

1.Open a new document in Word

2.Go to File, Page Set-up, choose landscape orientation

3.Go to columns on the standard tool bar

4.Go to Insert, then picture from files, then insert

5.Choose a photo (1 x 1.5)

6.Write the text of your prayer below the photo

7.Go to the beginning of the next column and insert either a new photo and new prayer or the same photo and text for multiples

8.Print on card stock or heavy paper

9.Cut out individual cards