![](atimo_s/articles_images/2022/12/lets-talk-logo-orange.png)
A prayer after Matthew
Monday, October 10, 2016
*Antonio Fernandez
This is the prayer I posted on my Facebook page on Thursday afternoon, Oct. 6:
Lord, thank you for protecting and taking care of us! Since early this morning, I trusted that by placing myself in your hands, I would be at peace and certain that you would take care of us.
At these moments, as the sun sets on this long day, it seems that, for us, the great danger of Matthew has already passed. I feel grateful and very glad that you have been so merciful with us.
But at the same time, I think and ask myself, why were we the ones protected? Why was there so much misfortune, so many losses in Haiti … in Cuba … in the Bahamas? I don’t judge your plans or question your ways … but it pains me and leaves me feeling somewhat disconcerted.
But then I answer my own questions, and I tell myself that You have spared us from anguish and losses so that we might now help those who have suffered the fury of Hurricane Matthew in other places, those who have lost the little they had, and have been thrust into worse situations of need and misery.
I think you wanted to show us our neighbor, who needs us and who urgently needs that we reveal to him the merciful face of the Father.
Let us thank God for protecting us, not with prayers and acts of devotion, but better yet by giving food to the hungry, clothing the naked, caring for the needy.
Let us read Matthew 25 in order to know how to show the Lord our gratitude at this moment, when we rejoice at not having experienced any losses of life or property due to this hurricane.