Despair and Prayer

There are upwards of seven billion humans on this planet (maybe more; that was only the last time I looked, which may have been 5 years ago). and most of them are in torment of one sort or another. Because of my own despair, because of the so-inescapable fulminating presence of evil (of human agency, ultimately, even if inspired by a greater Evil; we *do* still have "free will"), everywhere we look, I do not begin to imagine that my own "patience" (in Eliot's sense, or that of Job) is unique or even particularly important, except in my universe. So is it wrong for me to vex the issue of evil, to issue these impulsive "clamo(s) ad te," when all of humanity turns on the wheel? I haven't received any clear answer, at least not in my own mind, so perhaps I am just not praying in the right manner. Obviously, what I want is to see suffering obliterated for *everyone*, and by some less draconian expedient than the end of the world. Hardly a unique sentiment, for all of its endlessly manifest futility, and so *that* prayer must go up daily from billions of souls, and my contribution, except insofar as it touches my own condition, says absolutely nothing new to God. I do not know any other anodyne, though, or any other answer at all, but to pray, and I do know that there's one prayer that I have been told by an Unimpeachable Source *is* a right one.

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.

And I think I'll stop talking about evil. That it's ubiquitous has probably escaped absolutely no one but the sociopaths who cannot call it by its true name, so why bother? Perhaps, to acknowledge the Beast is only to feed it. Confusing, though, since I know it hates the Light. But I am certainly without temporal power, and do not seek it, so invocations from me have no resonance except in the ears of God. Who can hear me without my resorting to a blog post.