Orthodox prayers for addiction

Prayers for when drink, drugs or another addiction holds you or someone you love. Pray alongside treatment, never in its place.

Picture: Ary Scheffer, Saint Augustine and Saint Monica, 1854

5 prayers

For someone who is addicted

Prayer for alcoholism and addiction

Plain English only: no traditional English wording is given for this prayer

Master and Lord,You made man in Your image and likeness,and You gave him the Holy Spirit.Free Your fallen creature from slavery to the enemy.Open to them the doors of repentance,and send them a shining angelto free them from every snare of the enemy.

Hear, O God, those who fall down before Youin sorrow and grief.Do not turn Your face awayfrom those held by the ruinous passion of drink or drugs,but give them strength, hope and faith.Make their good resolve firm,and lead them to the abstinence that saves.Burn up the thorns of their sins,done willingly or unwillingly,so that Your grace may live in them,the grace that enlightens and cleanses the whole person.

Heal them of the grave illness of drunkenness or drug addiction.Set them free from darkness of spirit and hardness of heart.Give them health of soul and body,and set them on the path of hard work and godliness.Hear, merciful Lord, the cry of parents and relativeswho weep for their children and their loved ones.

For it is Yours to have mercy on us and to save us, our God,and to You we give glory,to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,now and always, and for ever and ever. Amen.

In 2014 the Russian Orthodox Church approved a service for people addicted to drink or drugs, and a priest says this prayer at its end. It also asks God to hear the parents and relatives who weep, and a family might pray it at home.

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Church Slavonic; no English translation was found. How the wording is made.

Where it comes from, and the Church Slavonic

If you are thinking of harming yourself, call or text 988 in the United States. If you are in danger right now, call 911 or your local emergency number. You do not have to carry this alone.

When you cannot turn by yourself

Turn me, and I shall be turned

You disciplined me, and I was disciplined,like a calf that was never trained.Turn me back, and I will turn back,for You are the LORD my God.

After I turned back, I repented;after I came to understand, I struck my thigh.I was ashamed and humiliated,because I carried the disgrace of my youth.

Traditional wording, 1611

Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised,as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke:turn Thou me, and I shall be turned;for Thou art the LORD my God.

Surely after that I was turned, I repented;and after that I was instructed, I smote upon my thigh:I was ashamed, yea, even confounded,because I did bear the reproach of my youth.

In the Book of Jeremiah, Ephraim (a name for God’s people) asks God to do the turning: “Turn me back, and I will turn back.” In the next verse God calls Ephraim His dear son and promises him mercy (Jeremiah 31:20).

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Hebrew, with the King James Version beside it. How the wording is made. Traditional wording: The King James translators, The King James Version, 1611.

The King James “unaccustomed to the yoke” adds the yoke, where the Hebrew says only that the calf was not trained.

Where it comes from, and the original

When it feels like a chain

O God, Whose nature is to have mercy

O God, it is Your naturealways to have mercy and to forgive.

Receive our prayer,and let the compassion of Your loveset free those who are held fastby the chain of sins.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Traditional wording, 1662

O God, Whose nature and propertyis ever to have mercy and to forgive,receive our humble petitions;

and though we be tied and boundwith the chain of our sins,yet let the pitifulness of Thy great mercy loose us;

for the honour of Jesus Christ,our Mediator and Advocate. Amen.

This Latin prayer from the late 700s asks God, Whose nature is always to have mercy, to set free all who are held fast by “the chain of sins”. It is short enough to say the moment a craving takes hold.

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Latin of the Gregorian Sacramentary (Wilson’s 1915 edition), with the Book of Common Prayer’s English beside it. How the wording is made. Traditional wording: The Church of England, The Book of Common Prayer, 1662.

The Prayer Book speaks of “our sins” and ends “for the honour of Jesus Christ”. The Latin prays for all whom the chain of sins binds and ends “through” Him.

Where it comes from, and the Latin

After a relapse

Ten thousand times I promised You

Christ Jesus, my Jesus,I am ruled by my passions.Ten thousand times I promised You that I would repent,but I broke my word, wretch that I am.

So, my Jesus, I cry to You:bring light to my soul, which is still numb, O Christ.God of our fathers, blessed are You.

Traditional wording, 2011

O Christ Jesus, ten thousand times have I, the passionate one,promised Thee repentance, O my Jesus,but wretch that I am, I deceived Thee.

Wherefore, I cry to Thee, my Jesus:Enlighten my soul which remaineth unfeeling;O Christ, the God of our fathers, blessed art Thou.

This verse of a long Orthodox hymn to Jesus speaks for anyone who has promised to stop and gone back again. It admits every broken promise, then asks Christ to bring light to a soul gone numb.

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Church Slavonic of the Kanonnik, with the Jordanville prayer book’s English beside it. How the wording is made. Traditional wording: Holy Trinity Monastery, Jordanville, Prayer Book, 2011.

The Jordanville’s “the passionate one” means someone ruled by passions, not someone eager.

Where it comes from, and the Church Slavonic

When you do what you hate

O wretched man that I am

I know that nothing good lives in me,that is, in my flesh.I want to do what is good,but I find no way to carry it out.I do not do the good I want to do,but the evil I do not want is what I do.And if I do what I do not want,it is no longer I who do it,but the sin that lives in me.

So I find this law at work:when I want to do good,evil is right there with me.In my inner self I delight in the law of God,but I see another law in my body,at war with the law of my mindand making me a prisonerof the law of sin that is in my body.

What a wretched person I am!Who will rescue me from this body of death?I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Traditional wording, 1611

For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing:for to will is present with me;but how to perform that which is good I find not.For the good that I would I do not:but the evil which I would not, that I do.Now if I do that I would not,it is no more I that do it,but sin that dwelleth in me.

I find then a law, that, when I would do good,evil is present with me.For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:But I see another law in my members,warring against the law of my mind,and bringing me into captivityto the law of sin which is in my members.

O wretched man that I am!who shall deliver me from the body of this death?I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Paul speaks as one who does the evil he hates, and he cries out, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” He answers at once with thanks to God through Jesus Christ, and the next chapter opens, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Greek of Romans 7:18-25, up to Paul’s thanks, with the King James wording beside it. How the wording is made. Traditional wording: The King James translators, The King James Version, 1611.

The King James “wretched man” stands for a Greek word that means any human being, so the plain wording says “person”.

Where it comes from, and the Greek

Scripture for this

¹I waited patiently for the LORD; He inclined to me and heard my cry. ²He lifted me up from the pit of despair, out of the miry clay; He set my feet upon a rock, and made my footsteps firm. ³He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD.

Psalm 40:1-3 The psalmist waited for the Lord, Who lifted him out of the pit and the mud and set his feet on a rock.

³⁴Jesus replied, “Truly, truly, I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. ³⁵A slave does not remain in the house forever, but a son remains forever. ³⁶So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

John 8:34-36 Jesus says that everyone who sins is a slave to sin, and that whoever the Son sets free will be free.

¹³Then they cried out to the LORD in their trouble, and He saved them from their distress. ¹⁴He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death and broke away their chains. ¹⁵Let them give thanks to the LORD for His loving devotion and His wonders to the sons of men. ¹⁶For He has broken down the gates of bronze and cut through the bars of iron.

Psalm 107:13-16 Prisoners cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and He brought them out of darkness and broke their chains.

²³The steps of a man are ordered by the LORD Who takes delight in his journey. ²⁴Though he falls, he will not be overwhelmed, for the LORD is holding his hand.

Psalm 37:23-24 Though a person falls, they are not cast down for good, because the Lord holds them by the hand.

¹Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray at all times and not lose heart: ²“In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected men. ³And there was a widow in that town who kept appealing to him, ‘Give me justice against my adversary.’ ⁴For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I neither fear God nor respect men, ⁵yet because this widow keeps pestering me, I will give her justice. Otherwise, she will wear me out with her perpetual requests.’” ⁶And the Lord said, “Listen to the words of the unjust judge. ⁷Will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry out to Him day and night? Will He delay in helping them?”

Luke 18:1-7 Jesus told this parable so that people would keep praying and not lose heart. It speaks to a family that has prayed for years.

Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.

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