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A spiritual comment and prayer to start the day with Fleur Dorrell

Good Morning.

When I was 14 my father made me a metal box which I’ve cherished ever since. I put my sports badges in it from my convent school days – athletics, netball and volleyball. The box with its art deco lid and beautiful hinge, contained my teenage hopes and dreams. When I open it now, I am straight back on the running track and reminded of those halcyon days.

Originally, Pandora’s box was actually a jar. In Greek mythology Pandora was the first woman to be created. She was given a jar full of the best gifts of the gods and goddesses to preserve for the human race. But among all the gifts that Zeus - the Father of the gods - had also planted, were evil, toil and illness. Pandora’s curiosity got the better of her and so she opened it, and the gifts and curses flew around the earth. By the time she closed the jar - only hope remained!

Sometimes the world feels out of control, and we want to ‘put a lid on it’. Or we seek a knowledge and power that have consequences that we cannot anticipate, and which neither free us nor those around us as we perceive they should.
In spite of what emerged, Pandora kept hold of hope, and so can we. We cannot undo the past, but we can face the future in hope and use our own gifts for the healing of the world.

I pray that today we will discern the times with more wisdom and less curiosity. May we be vessels of hope and a blessing in our time, bringing people together rather than fragmenting the earth.

Amen.