Mayor’s prayer event emphasizes compassion

By Linda Linonis

U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan served as keynote speaker for the breakfast.

GIRARD — A call for compassion highlighted the 24th annual Mayors’ Prayer Breakfast.

The Mahoning Valley Association of Churches sponsored the event, which was attended by about 180 people Tuesday morning at Mahoning Country Club.

Rabbi Franklin Muller of Congregation Rodef Sholom in Youngstown asked God “to kindle in us a passion for compassion” in his opening prayer.

The keynote speaker, U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Niles, D-17th, continued the thought by discussing how compassion relates to individual, business and governmental responsibility.

Ryan credited the faith community with being at the forefront of speaking out on human and civil rights issues. And he noted that it is the faith community that infuses compassion into a world bombarded with news about violence.

Ryan asked the audience to ask themselves these questions: What can one do as an individual to be more compassionate and what can we do as a society to promote compassion?

He said examining the definition of compassion — the deep awareness of the suffering of another and the wish to relieve it — is the first step. “Being compassionate is to be so deeply aware [of suffering] that you are one with them,” he said.

The congressman, of an Italian-Irish and Catholic background, offered the example of his Italian grandparents who said the rosary. “It was their way of reflecting,” he said.

Ryan learned that reflection and meditation crossed faith lines while on a trip to China and Tibet. “I was a Catholic from Niles in Tibet but I thought I was in Vatican City. Holy people in religious garb — Buddhists — were using prayer beads,” he said.

Ryan said he has read various studies about meditation and its effect on people. He said the “centering prayer” makes people “feel good” and “want to get off their butts and do something.”

Though problems and situations worldwide seem overwhelming, Ryan said, “they are man-made and can be solved by man.”

He said that “putting together a compassionate agenda” should be a priority from Washington to Columbus to local city halls. “Compassion is not a religion, but what ties us together,” he said.

“We know what to do ... but we get too caught up in busy lives,” he said. “But it is our responsibility to be stewards of God’s creation.”

Ryan promoted the “need for a spiritual revival” and how people of faith will “poke and prod” to bring about progress in human- rights issues such as health care.

The Rev. Lewis Macklin of Holy Trinity Missionary Baptist Church in Youngstown remembered the late Edna Pincham as one of the promoters of the prayer breakfast. “She was a cheerleader for this event that took secular and sacred communities and brought them together,” he said.

The Rev. Dan Bryant, district superintendent of Mahoning Valley District of the United Methodist Church, asked each person “to weave the strands from our lives into a tapestry of compassion.”

Imam Walid Abuasi of the Islamic Society of Greater Youngstown said, “There is no religion or faith that doesn’t teach love, mercy and compassion” and urged all to use those qualities to end suffering.

Girard school choruses, directed by Sue Ellen Davis, sang patriotic selections.