An Agnostic’s Thanksgiving Prayer

December 2, 2015

One morning last week, we all woke up to the news that Turkey had shot down a Russian fighter jet. This prompted one of those foxhole prayers we agnostics offer up in times of crisis:

God, please let this not be a shot heard round the world and the beginning of World War III.

It takes quite a lot to scare me into prayer. I’m often grouchy, and I’m nearly always sarcastic and cynical, but I’m also a glass-half-full optimist who feels very lucky with how her life has played out so far. I usually shrug off a Facebook feed full of doom and gloom, confident that humanity’s march toward little-E enlightenment, tolerance, and peace continues. Progress may be a two steps forward, one step backward dance, but we’ve come a long way since the big-E Enlightenment philosophers and scientists pointed us down…