April 22, 2020

A candlelight vigil, hosted by United Churches in Nova Scotia, was recorded live on April 22 and is available for viewing.

The unimaginable events in Nova Scotia have broken hearts open across the nation. There is no sense to be made of the horror — all we can do is join our broken hearts together. Be well, stay safe, God bless.

Watch the Prayer Vigil for Nova Scotia held on April 22, 2020

The “Blessing for the Brokenhearted” quoted at the closing of the vigil is posted below.

Blessing for the Brokenhearted

by Jan Richardson

There is no remedy for love but to love more.
— Henry David Thoreau

Let us agree
for now
that we will not say
the breaking
makes us stronger
or that it is better
to have this pain
than to have done
without this love.

Let us promise
we will not
tell ourselves
time will heal
the wound,
when every day
our waking
opens it anew.

Perhaps for now
it can be enough
to simply marvel
at the mystery
of how a heart
so broken
can go on beating,
as if it were made
for precisely this —

as if it knows
the only cure for love
is more of it,

as if it sees
the heart’s sole remedy
for breaking
is to love still,

as if it trusts
that its own
persistent pulse
is the rhythm
of a blessing
we cannot
begin to fathom
but will save us
nonetheless.

by Jan Richardson  The Cure for Sorrow.