Adapted from a prayer by Reverend Ignacio Castuera

Gracious God, you who guided Naomi and her family to look for bread in Moab, a foreign land, protect the women everywhere who have to leave behind their home or homelands so that they and their families can survive.

May those who are escaping the ravages of war find shelter and sustenance. May the land in which they seek refuge welcome them and treat them with hospitality.

May those who are seeking to stop the threats of violence against them find a peaceful and healing place. Help them hold on to their hope for a new beginning. And may those who are fleeing from the famines that starve them and their children find relief from their painful and debilitating hunger. May they find food both for their journey and for their bodies.

You who guided Ruth to go to the Promised Land, grant that, like her, women may be lifted from the fields where they harvest to be part of royal lineage. And grant that we who are the spiritual descendants of those of old who were told that the holiest of trinities was made of the widow, the orphan and the migrant, be given the courage to see your face, your real presence, in the faces of women who have great need.

Amen.