Prayers for the Holidays

The holidays are not one feeling. For some people they are the best weeks of the year. For others they are the hardest, the first Christmas without someone, the table with an empty chair, the relative who will not speak to you, the month when the money does not stretch. Most of us get some of both.

These prayers are organised by what you are actually carrying into the season rather than by which day it is. Find the one that matches. If you want prayers for a specific holiday, the last section points you to those.

The Holiday Season Grace at the Table The Empty Chair First Holiday After a Loss Alone at the Holidays A Tense Family Table Hard Questions When Money Is Tight For Whoever Is Cooking When It Is Too Much Travel By Holiday Bible Verses Questions

A Prayer for the Holiday Season

Say this one at the start of the season, before the calendar fills up.

Dear God,

Thank You for the weeks ahead and for everyone I will share them with. Thank You in advance for the ordinary moments I will forget and the ones I will remember for years.

Keep me from measuring this season against the ones before it, or against anyone else’s. Let me be present for what is actually in front of me rather than what I planned.

Where there is joy, let me not rush past it. Where there is grief, sit with me in it. Where there is tension, make me the one who lowers the temperature rather than raises it.

And keep the point of it in front of me when everything else gets loud.

Amen.

Lord, this season asks a lot of me. Give me enough, enough patience, enough money, enough energy, enough grace. Amen.

Grace at the Holiday Table

Someone is about to be asked to say grace, and it might be you. Here are the forms that work, from shortest to longest.

A one-line grace

Lord, thank You for this food and for everyone around this table. Amen.

A short grace with a little more to it

Father, thank You for this meal, for the hands that made it, and for the people You have gathered here. Bless the food and bless this table. Amen.

A grace a child can say

Thank You, God, for the food we eat.
Thank You, God, for everyone here.
Thank You, God, for everything.
Amen.

The traditional grace

Bless us, O Lord, and these Your gifts, which we are about to receive from Your bounty. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

The standard Catholic grace before meals, and the one most likely to be recognised around a mixed table.

A grace that names the people who are missing

Father, thank You for this food and for everyone here. We are also thinking of the ones who are not, the ones far away, and the ones we have lost. Hold them and hold us. Amen.

Worth using at the first holiday after a death. It gives everyone permission to feel what they are already feeling.

A grace for a table where not everyone believes the same thing

For this food, for this table, and for the people around it; we are grateful. May we be as generous with each other as we have been with this meal. Amen.

Keeps the thanks sincere without putting anyone in an awkward position.

When There Is an Empty Chair

Everyone at the table can see it. Nobody wants to be the one to mention it. Pray this before you go in.

God, there is a chair at that table that should not be empty, and everyone knows it.

I am not asking You to make it hurt less today. I am asking You to let us say their name out loud without the room going quiet, and to let us laugh at something they would have laughed at.

Be with whoever is struggling most today, especially if they are hiding it well.

Amen.

Lord, I miss them most at this time of year. Thank You for every holiday I had with them. Keep them safe with You, and keep me steady here. Amen.

For longer prayers in bereavement, see our prayers for those who have died and our prayers for comfort.

The First Holiday After a Loss

The first one is its own thing. You are not just grieving the person; you are grieving every tradition that had them in it.

Father, this is the first one without them and I do not know how to do it.

I do not know whether to keep the traditions or change them. I do not know whether to talk about them or leave it alone. Nobody has told me the right way and I do not think there is one.

Give me permission to do this badly. Let me cry in the kitchen if I need to and come back out. Let me get through today, and let next year be a little easier.

Amen.

Lord, I do not want to celebrate. Help me to be here anyway, for the people who need me to be. Amen.

When You Are Spending the Holidays Alone

God, everyone else seems to be somewhere and I am here.

Take the sting out of today. Let me not spend it scrolling through other people’s tables. Show me one small thing to do that makes this day mine rather than a day I am getting through.

And if there is someone else alone today who I could call, bring them to mind.

Amen.

Lord, You are here. That is not nothing, and today I need it to be enough. Amen.

If the season is bringing something heavier with it, our prayers in depression may be closer to what you need.

When the Family Table Is Tense

Estrangement, an old argument nobody resolved, a person who is difficult every single year. Pray in the car before you go in.

Lord, I know what usually happens at this table and I do not want it to happen again this year.

Guard my mouth. Let me not take the bait, and let me not set it either. If someone is unkind, let it land on me and stop there rather than travelling round the room.

Give me something better than being right.

Amen.

Father, there is someone in that house I have not spoken to properly in years. If today is the day, give me the first sentence. If it is not, let me be kind anyway. Amen.

God, keep me patient with the person who tests it most. They may be having a harder year than I know. Amen.

For the longer version of that work, see our prayers for peace.

When Relatives Ask the Questions You Are Dreading

Why are you still single. When are you having children. How is the job hunt going. Have you thought about losing a little weight.

Lord, they are going to ask, and it is going to land on the exact spot that already hurts.

Give me an answer that is honest and short. Let me not perform, and let me not snap. Remind me that most of them are asking clumsily rather than cruelly.

And where the question hurts because I am asking it myself, meet me there afterwards.

Amen.

When Money Is Tight This Christmas

One of the quietest sources of holiday dread, and one almost nobody prays about out loud.

God, I cannot give them what I want to give them this year.

Take the shame out of that. Let the people who love me not be measuring, and where they are, let me stop caring so much what they think.

Provide what we actually need. Help me not to solve this with debt I will still be paying in June. And let my children remember this year for something other than what was under the tree.

Amen.

Father, thank You for what we do have. It is more than I am counting right now. Amen.

For Whoever Is Doing All the Cooking

Lord, bless whoever is in that kitchen. Bless their back and their patience and the timing of everything coming out at once.

Let them be thanked properly. Let them sit down and actually eat. And let somebody else do the dishes.

Amen.

God, I have been planning this for weeks and I am already tired. Let it be good enough. It does not have to be perfect for people to feel loved. Amen.

When the Season Is Simply Too Much

Father, there is too much. Too many invitations, too many expectations, too much noise, too little time.

Show me what to say no to. Take the guilt out of that. Give me one quiet hour somewhere in the next week that belongs to nobody else.

Amen.

Lord, slow me down. I am moving through these weeks and not living in them. Amen.

If the season is winding you tight, our prayers for anxiety go further.

For Safe Travel Over the Holidays

Lord, we are on the road today with everyone else. Keep us safe, keep us calm, and keep us kind to each other in the car.

Watch over everyone travelling to see the people they love, and bring them all home again.

Amen.

Father, be with the ones flying today, and with the ones waiting at the other end. Amen.

See also our prayers for protection.

Prayers for Each Holiday

Thanksgiving

Lord, thank You for this year, for what went well and for what I survived. Thank You for the people at this table and for the ones who could not come. We are grateful, and we know who to be grateful to. Amen.

For the full set (short graces, a prayer before the meal, and the going-around-the-table version) see our Thanksgiving prayers, or our prayers of gratitude for the rest of the year.

Christmas

Heavenly Father, thank You for sending Your Son into an ordinary night in a small town. Help us to hear the story again as though we had never heard it. Let the wonder of it reach us through all the noise of this week. Amen.

Lord, in the middle of the rush I want to stop and be with You for a moment. You are the beginning and the end of my days, and You are the actual reason for this season. Thank You for loving me. Amen.

New Year

Lord, You make all things new. Thank You for the year behind me, including the parts I would not choose again, and for the one ahead that I cannot see yet. Go into it before me. Amen.

Easter

Jesus, You have overcome death and every fear that comes with it. Help me to live today as though that were true, because it is. The Lord is risen. Amen.

Bible Verses for the Holidays

“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
1 Thessalonians 5:18

“And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”
Luke 2:12

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
Romans 15:13

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
Psalm 34:18

“Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever.”
Psalm 136:1

“She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
Matthew 1:21

“Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.”
Romans 12:10

Questions About Holiday Prayers

What is a good prayer to say before a holiday meal?

Short is better than impressive. Everyone is hungry and some of them are uncomfortable. “Lord, thank You for this food and for everyone around this table. Amen” is a complete grace. If you want a little more, thank God for the food, for whoever cooked it, and for the people present, then stop.

How do you pray at a table where not everyone is religious?

Keep it warm and keep it brief, and do not use the moment to make a point. A grace that thanks God for the food and the people, without asking anyone else to affirm anything, lets believers pray sincerely and lets everyone else simply be present. There is a version above written for exactly that table.

What do you pray when the holidays are painful rather than happy?

Pray about the specific thing rather than about the season in general. Grief, loneliness, a fractured family, money, each has its own prayer above. A prayer that names the actual problem tends to help more than one that asks God to make you feel festive.

How do you pray for someone grieving during the holidays?

Ask for two things: that they get through the day, and that they are allowed to feel what they feel while doing it. Then say the name of the person they lost, out loud, in your prayer. Most grieving people are far more frightened of their person being forgotten than of someone mentioning them.

Should I keep our traditions after someone has died?

There is no rule, and anyone who tells you otherwise is guessing. Some families find the traditions are what holds them together; others find that keeping them exactly the same is unbearable the first year. It is reasonable to change one thing and keep the rest, and it is reasonable to decide differently next year.

What is a short prayer for holiday travel?

“Lord, keep us safe, keep us calm, and bring us home again. Amen.” Say it before you pull out of the driveway rather than while merging.

Send a Prayer to Jerusalem

If this season is carrying something you cannot put down, you can send it to be prayed over in Jerusalem. Your prayer is printed and placed inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial and resurrection) and you receive photographs of it there by email within a few days.

Write it from the heart. It is placed and photographed once, so make it count.