By Johnson Babalola
I often visit TikTok mainly to listen to unique, soul-lifting, and educational songs and messages. I enjoy comedy too. By chance, I recently stumbled on a young man’s page, and something he said struck me deeply. It made me pause and reflect on the way some of us pray today—and on the words we use in sacred spaces.
Growing up in Ijare as a young boy, Sundays at St. Peter’s Anglican Church followed a familiar rhythm. Our prayers were mostly pre-written, simple, and measured. As was common in Anglican churches then—and largely still is—prayers were read from the prayer book. We focused on the Lord’s Prayer, prayers for leaders, the church, ourselves, our communities, and others. Thanksgiving was always included. The prayers were clear, restrained, and thoughtful. No dramatics. No competition. Just reverence and order.
Back to the TikTok story.
The young man shared that his grandmother passed away close to the New Year, in December 2025, and was buried on New Year’s Eve. Later that night, he went to church for the crossover service. During the prayer session, the person leading the prayers asked the congregation to thank God for His mercy for bringing them through 2025, adding that some people died in 2025 and did not make it to 2026.
He said that line immediately troubled him. Sitting there, freshly bereaved, he began to wonder: Did that mean my grandmother did not receive God’s mercy? Did others who died lack God’s favor? Instead of comfort, the prayer left him feeling depressed and unsettled. To him, it reflected a lack of sensitivity to the reality that many people present that night were likely mourning—parents, children, spouses, siblings.
Such words, even if unintentional, can cut deep. They can leave people questioning God’s love for their departed loved ones, or even for themselves, now left behind in pain.
This brings us to a broader issue.
We all have a collective responsibility to be mindful of our words and actions, especially in public spaces and places of worship where words carry weight, authority, and spiritual meaning. Before we offer prayers of thanksgiving that emphasize being alive, healthy, employed, wealthy, or “favored,” we must pause and ask ourselves: What about those in the congregation who are grieving? Those who are unemployed, disabled, childless, sick, or struggling?
Some may argue that prayers must speak truth or reflect gratitude regardless of circumstances. That may be so. But wisdom teaches us that not every truth must be spoken everywhere, and not every gratitude must be framed in ways that unintentionally wound others. Certain prayers—especially comparative ones—are better whispered within the four walls of our private rooms than proclaimed loudly over a diverse congregation carrying different burdens.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with thanking God for His mercy, preservation, and provision. But must we do so by reminding those who are mourning, poor, disabled, or broken of what they have lost—or what they lack?
Faith should heal, not reopen wounds.
May we all be clothed in the wisdom of God—the wisdom that teaches us to speak with compassion, to pray with empathy, and to remember that sensitivity is not weakness, but love in action.
*Johnson Babalola is a Canadian lawyer