Happy New Year, Mormon Matters listeners!  To start 2018, I asked many of my friends if they would consider writing prayers for the new year or share favorite prayers they have gained strength from in the past. More than twenty responded! Recordings of them reading these prayers are included in this three-part episode, along with brief introductions of each person and a bit of background about the prayer they wrote or chose to share. They are diverse, and range from prayers in pretty standard Mormon forms, to prayer-poems, and prose essays. The participants represent a variety of voices and perspectives: women, men, believers, agnostics/atheists, engaged Latter-day Saints, lapsed Mormons, and two women who are attending divinity school. All share one thing, though: They have been on marvelous, integrity-filled journeys with God/Spirit/the Universe. I know you will really enjoy getting to know them and their hearts in this intimate way. Part 1 (Ep. 438) features prayers from:

Susan Hinckley, Eric Samuelsen, Lisa Scott, Rick Jepson, Sonja Farnsworth, Tom Kimball, Megan Kjar Christiansen, and Richard Ostler.

Part 2 (Ep. 439) features prayers from:

Laurie Lee Hall, Scott Turley, Gina Colvin, Scot Denhalter, Jody England Hansen, Stephen Carter, Merrie Smithson, John Gustav-Wrathall, Fiona Givens, and Joseph Stanford

Part 3 (Ep. 440) features prayers from: Becky and Shannon Linford, Mark Crego, Katie Langston, Leon Maynard, Sydnie Olsen, Greg Olsen, Carol Lynn Pearson, and Dan Wotherspoon