The Serenity Prayer God, give us the grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other :: living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time :: accepting hardship as a pathway to peace :: taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it :: trusting that You will make all things right if I surrender to Your will :: so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with You forever in the next. AMEN Reinhold Niebuhr A note from his wife, Ursula My husband wrote what has come to be known as the "Serenity Prayer" in the early 1940's. He not only wrote it but used it in services or when preaching in Heath, a little hill village in Western Massachusetts, where for many years we used to spend the summer. After one of those, a good friend and neighbor, the late Howard Chandler Robbins, who formerly had been Dean of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York and also Professor of Pastoral Theology of the General Theological Seminary, asked Reinhold for a copy of the prayer. My husband reached into his pocket and handed it over to Dr. Robbins. At times, other organizations have asked for the use of it. I remember an Episcopal sisterhood in the Middle West (Wisconsin, I think) printed it very nicely on little cards. Also, Alcoholics Anonymous has used it widely with the permission of my husband. Frequently, the prayer is repeated not quite as he wrote it. Here is the form he preferred:           God, give us the grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other. My husband used to have several letters a week about his prayer, and in these later years I have had many inquiries. The prayer obviously has been very much appreciated, also very much used, even though sometimes the form has varied Ursula Niebuhr via The Society of St. Paul

This page was last updated on: June 25, 2003

It Is Well With My Soul MIDI sequence by Bob Sorem. Used with permission http://www.tc.umn.edu/~sorem002/midis.html