The Importance of Mercy

O Lord, why do you make us err from your ways and harden our hearts so that we fear you not? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your heritage. Your holy people possessed your sanctuary a little while. Our adversaries have trodden it down. We have become like those over whom you have never ruled,. Like those who are not called by your name. There is no one that calls upon your name, that bestures himself to take hold of you. You have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquities. Yet O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are our potter