A Prayer for Strained Family Relationships

Most of us have had a strained family relationship at some point in our lives.

They’re painful and heartbreaking, especially when the person we have this strained relationship with is someone we were once very close with.

These strained relationships can consume us. They can drain us from the emotional energy spent on lamenting the disruption of harmony in this relationship and in figuring out ways that we can “fix” the relationship.

What’s worse is that the disruption can spread to those in our close circle who try to help and rectify the situation, perhaps with good intentions, , but they eventually end up taking sides or causing more damage due to a lack of understanding of the complete situation about what led to this strained relationship.

In those times, it is good to remember just how much Jesus loves us and how much He also loves our family member. He knows our hearts best and yearns to heal our wounds.

Never forget the source of all healing is His Most Sacred Heart, which burns with His abundant love each day with a desire to bring all of us into perfect union with Him.

It is also important to remember that for a situation to truly resolve in a perfectly divine way, we need to allow Jesus to be in control. Sometimes that will involve action on our part. Sometimes that will involve remaining silent and letting Jesus act. But it will always involve surrendering ourselves, our loved ones, and the situation to Him.

Here is a prayer that will help you do just that.

---

A Prayer for Strained Family Relationships

Jesus, I bring to you myself and my family member.

You know our hearts, our wounds, and our sins.

You know how much I love and care for my family member.

Jesus, You also know our relationships is strained. It’s been mangled by hurtful worlds and actions.

You saw the times I spoke and acted in ways that have injured the heart of my family member from a place of defensiveness and hurt.

You also saw how my own heart was torn by my family member’s words and actions, which came from a place of deep pain.

Jesus, help me to remember we are both children of God. Help me to remember we were created in His love.

Help me to remember when I hurt others and when others hurt me that this is not who we were created to be.

Jesus, I ache for the reunion of our hearts. I yearn for the days of old when our relationship was good, peaceful, harmonious, and filled with laughter and good tears.

Jesus, I feel I’ve done all I can do. I’ve spent my last efforts on trying to repair this strained relationship. So now I hand it over to You.

I entrust both of us into Your Most Sacred Heart.

When I desire so deeply to fix our relationship, help me to first come to You and ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance in what I should do or say, or if I should stay still in Your presence, trusting You are healing our relationship in this very moment without me lifting a finger.

Where there is pain, heal the layers of infection that has caused resentment and any desire for revenge.

Where there is sadness, lift our hearts to hear the choirs of angels singing of Your glory in heaven.

Where there is anxiety about the future and fears of our relationship never being healed, fill me with the joy of knowing healing has already begun through my entrustment of our relationship to You.

Jesus, Your Heart is the source of all hope, peace, love, and healing.

Fill me with the peace of knowing that You are watching over us and You are tending to our aching hearts. You are calling us out of our misery to rest in You.

Help me to offer up the pain of my longing for our restored relationship and unite it to Your longing to be reunited with all of God’s children who are in pain and misery because they are unaware of their need for their Savior.

Help me to remember that You desire that we spend eternity with You and with each other. Help me to trust so deeply in Your Divine timing that I know within the depths of my soul that even should reconciliation not happen in this life, in the next life we will worship You side by side forever.

Jesus, I entrust myself to You, with all my hurt, sinfulness, and woundedness.

I entrust to You my family member, who I know deep within their heart also desires purification, healing, and to rest in Your peace.

Jesus, I trust in You. I surrender myself and my loved one into Your Most Merciful, Loving, Healing, and Sacred Heart, trusting there You will cleanse our sins, heal our wounds, and restore our relationship to one which gives all glory to You.

Amen, my Jesus, amen.