Allow your children to "suffer" in the pews

It's Friday and I'm sure we all have plans for tonight after a long work week. But it's the season for prayer and fasting for the Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos. (The Falling asleep of the Virgin Mary.)

Christians are being persecuted is the Middle East. They are threatened to convert, pay a tax or die. They are taken into slavery. They have been left to starve to death on a mountain.

We have all the freedoms to worship and our churches are empty during this time of crisis. Please consider changing your Friday plans to attend Paraklesis. Allow your children to "suffer" in the pews for an hour as we gather to pray to the Panagia for the children who are truly suffering persecution and genocide in Iraq.

Just tell them, "There are children in the world who need our prayers tonight.  We are going to go to church and ask the Virgin Mary to protect them and guard them against danger.  We have the freedom and therefore the responsibility to do this for them.  When church is over we can go back to doing what we planned.  But for 45 minutes we will pray for the world."