Your prayers for the United Reformed Church 2025 Prayer Handbook, with the theme Immersive Joy, are now invited.
Wherever you are, wherever you have been, whatever the journey which moves you to write, we would love to hear from you.
Prayer Handbook Editors, the Revd Susan McCoan and the Revd Stephen Ansa-Addo, URC Ministers at Ealing and Wembley Park, and Reading and Hungerford respectively, invite you to consider the theme and the ways it relates to the church and its life and work, as well as your personal experiences.
As well as the usual Lectionary-based prayers, there are prayers for everyday and extraordinary use.
You are invited to write as you would pray – no special words or format is needed – to allow us the privilege of sharing your prayers with others in the URC and beyond.
You can submit a maximum of four prayers to be considered, which must be your own – original work for which you have copyright. Materials you have written for local church use, or prayers for private or corporate use can also be submitted for consideration.
While the prayers can draw on any relevant and topical theme, you are asked to avoid direct reference to specific/immediate events which may cause the prayers to become quickly dated.
You don’t have to fit your prayers to the Lectionary, but if you wish to do so, please indicate what week or readings you have used.
To help with formatting, prayers should be a maximum length of 20 lines, each line having no more than 60 characters including spaces and punctuation. Please give each prayer a title.
The editors look forward to receiving and reading all submissions but cannot guarantee that every prayer will be included in the final handbook. Copyright for any prayers used will be held jointly between the author and the URC.
The deadline for submissions is 24 February 2024, and you will be informed by late March whether your prayer(s) will be included. If your prayer is to be used, we will engage with you as follows:
The first edit of your writing and its return to you will be made to by mid to late April for you to accept, consider and address any suggested changes or rewrites. Submitting prayers for consideration includes your permission for them to be edited.
Your final re-worked version will be expected by early to May so the Editors can have the final text ready by the end of June.
We thank you in advance for your thoughtful and prayerful writing.
- Please submit your prayers, or any questions about the prayer handbook or the process, by email to: phb@urc.org.uk
- The 2024 URC Prayer Handbook, Full to the Brim, is available from the URC Bookshop.