THE PRAYER OF PARLIAMENT

At the commencement of every plenary sitting of Parliament, the Clerk of Parliament or, in current practice, one of his assistants at the Table, says the parliamentary prayer.  This prayer is a summary edition of that intoned by Governor George Beresford Stooke in the early 1950s to open the sittings of the Legislative Council.  It now reads:

            ALMIGHTY GOD,

WITHOUT WHOSE HELP LABOUR IS USELESS

WITHOUT WHOSE LIGHT SEARCH IS VAIN

WE THY UNWORTHY SERVANTS HERE GATHERED IN THY NAME

DO MOST HUMBLY BESEECH THEE TO SEND DOWN THY HEAVENLY WISDOM FROM ABOVE TO DIRECT AND GUIDE US IN ALL OUR DELIBERATIONS; AND LAYING ASIDE ALL PRIVATE INTERESTS, PREJUDICES AND PARTIAL AFFECTION, THE RESULT OF ALL COUNSELS MAY BE TO THE GLORY OF THY BLESSED NAME.

This invocation to LIGHT, for enlightenment, is an aspirational symbol, a guiding light for the debates in plenary on national matters.