A Prayer for the Cubs...Yeah, right.

Lord, we stand before you here today stripped of our comfort. We are alone. Our dear friends have deserted us in our neediest moments and we find it harder than ever to believe in your great name. Oh Lord.

Lord, Take our hands through this tunnel of darkness and lead us in the general direction of deep left center field where Eric Byrnes and Chris Young might have a collision just bad enough to hurt both of them for the rest of the playoffs but not in any way endanger their careers or general well-being. Lord, your name is great, and you give us hope, precious hope, but we ask in pure humbleness and modesty to put the Cubs ahead by at least three runs as early as the first inning so that we don't have to watch them struggle to score from behind as Soriano, Lee, and Ramirez strike out late in the game with runners on second and third and less than two outs. Oh Lord.

We fill our hearts with prayer for you. With join in song every 7th inning and try our very hardest not to spill any peanuts, hot dog mustard, or Pepsi on the person in front of us. But Lord, we need your help.

Stay with us through the evening, through Craig Sager's terrible jackets (did you know he was Willie the Wildkit when he attended Northwestern University? well of course you did Lord, I just wanted to say thank you once again for blessing us with Wikipedia), through knowing that Steve Stone would announce another team's game, through a day of watching Sportscenter highlights of Cleveland and Boston get clutch hits by their best players and seeing Mike Lowell cracking jokes in the dugout while the Cubs' players peed their pants over and over again...Lord. Please. We need you more than ever.

Amen.