![the Open Siddur Project [logo]](https://opensiddur.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Open-Siddur-Project-Logo-2016.svg){kind=logo}
Sponsor: Rep. William S. Broomfield (R-MI)
Date of Prayer: 27 March 1979
Mr. BROOMFIELD. Mr. Speaker, it is an honor and a pleasure to welcome, as our guest this afternoon, Rabbi David A. Nelson of Congregation Beth Shalom, in Oak Park, Michigan. I would like to thank him for his inspiring opening prayer.
Before coming to Michigan, Rabbi Nelson held pulpits in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and in our neighboring city of Baltimore, Maryland. In 1972, he took up his present position at Congregation Beth Shalom.
While providing spiritual leadership to the people of his congregation, Rabbi Nelson has also been an active community leader.
He has served as president of the Conservative Rabbis of Metropolitan Detroit; a member of the Anti-Defamation League Cabinet; and as a member of the Detroit Round Table of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. He is also the director of the Michigan Region of the United Synagogues of America. Rabbi Nelson was also appointed by the city of Southfield, Michigan, to serve as a member of the Total Living Commission, and as an advisory board member to the Southfield City Council. He is also on the advisory board of the Oakland County Mental Health Associates and the Michigan Council on Alcohol Problems.
Rabbi Nelson is not the first member of his family to offer the opening prayer before this body. On May 23, 1963, the House of Representatives was honored to hear the profound words of his father, the late Rabbi Harry Nelson.
Mr. Speaker, Rabbi Nelson is accompanied by two of his three children this afternoon, Harry, age 11, and Debra, age 10.
I would like to welcome all three to Washington, and to again thank Rabbi David Nelson for his inspirational message.
| Contribute a translation | Source (English) |
|---|---|
O Lord our God, how excellent is Thy name in all the Earth and without whom no human work can long prosper, we beseech Thee to bestow upon the Members of this body wisdom and courage equal to their responsibilities. | |
We acknowledge with gratitude the glorious achievements in working for the cause of peace in the Middle East. Help us now to widen the horizons of our hearts to encompass all mankind in a common love and mutual respect. | |
Grant that our beloved country be a mighty force for righteousness among people, ever seeking to provide more adequate forms of freedom and justice for all its citizens and ever advancing the cause of democracy and peace among all nations of the world. | |
May the Lord endow us with strength; may the Lord bless us all with peace. Amen. |
This prayer of the guest chaplain was offered in the second month of the second session of the 96th US Congress in the House of Representatives, and published in the Congressional Record, vol. 125, part 5 (1979), page 6283.
Source(s)
Congressional Record, vol 125, part 5 (27 March 1979), p. 6283
“Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi David A. Nelson on 27 March 1979” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International copyleft license.
(This image is set to automatically show as the "featured image" in shared links on social media.)
- Properly attribute the work to David A. Nelson, the Congressional Record of the United States of America and Aharon N. Varady (transcription).
- Clearly indicate the date you accessed the work and in what ways, if any, you modified it. (If you have adapted the work, let us know so that the contributor might consider endorsing your revision.)
- Provide the stable link to this resource: <https://opensiddur.org/?p=55041>.
- Indicate that the original work was shared under the Creative Commons Zero (CC 0) Universal license a Public Domain dedication. (To redistribute or remix this work in any format, modified or unmodified, you must refer to the terms of the license under which the work is shared.)
- The views expressed in this work represent the views of their creator(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of the Open Siddur Project's developers, its diverse community of volunteer contributors, or its institutional partners.
- We strongly advise against printing sacred texts and art containing divine names as these copies must be regarded with reverence, complicating their casual treatment and disposal.
- If you must dispose of a printed sacred text (one containing Divine Names), please locate the closest genizah (often established by a synagogue) and contact its custodians for further instructions. We also recommend using Morah Yehudis Fishman's Prayer for Adding a Work to the Genizah.
Comments, Corrections, and Queries