This week our prayer focus is: Liam Neeson

Liam John Neeson is an Irish actor who has been nominated for an Oscar, a BAFTA and three Golden Globe Awards.  Liam was born in Ballymena, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, and is the son of Katherine Kitty, a cook, and Bernard "Barney" Neeson, a caretaker at Ballymena Boys All Saints Primary School. He was raised Roman Catholic and was called Liam (the Irish and Scottish form of William) after the local priest. He was the third of four siblings; he has three sisters, Elizabeth, Bernadette, and Rosaline. At age nine, Liam began boxing lessons at the All Saints Youth Club, and later became Ulster amateur senior boxing champion. At age eleven, he first stepped on stage. His English teacher gave him the lead role in a school play, which he accepted because the girl he was attracted to would be starring. From then on, he kept acting in school productions for the following years.

 

His interest in acting and decision to become an actor was also influenced by Free Presbyterian minister Ian Paisley, whose church Neeson would sneak into. Neeson has said of Paisley that "He had a magnificent presence and it was incredible to watch this six foot-plus man just Bible-thumping away... It was acting but it was also great acting and stirring too."

 

Liam was enrolled in 1971 as a physics and computer science undergraduate student at Queen's University Belfast in Belfast, Northern Ireland, before leaving to work for the Guinness Brewery.

He discovered a talent for football at Queens University. He was spotted by Seán Thomas at Bohemian F.C. There was a club trial in Dublin. He only played one game as a substitute against Shamrock Rovers and was not offered a contract to continue playing.

After leaving university, Liam returned to Ballymena where he worked in a variety of casual jobs, from a fork-lift operator at Guinness to a truck driver. He also attended teacher training college in Newcastle for two years before again returning to his home town. In 1976, Neeson joined the Lyric Players' Theatre in Belfast where he performed for two years. He got his first film experience in 1977, playing Jesus Christ and Evangelist in the religious film, Pilgrim's Progress directed by Ken Anderson. Neeson moved to Dublin in 1978 after he was offered a part in a production at the Project Arts Centre. The play was Ron Hutchinson's "Says I, Says He", a drama about The Troubles. He acted in several other Project productions and joined the Abbey Theatre. In 1980, filmmaker John Boorman saw him on stage, acting as Lennie Small in Of Mice and Men, and offered him the part of Sir Gawain in the upcoming Arthurian film, Excalibur. After Excalibur, Liam moved to London, where he continued working on stage, small budget films and television series. He lived with the actress Helen Mirren at this time, whom he met working on Excalibur. Between 1982 and 1987, Liam starred in five films; most notably alongside Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins in 1984's The Bounty and Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons in 1986's The Mission. He also starred as a guest actor in the third season of the television series Miami Vice in 1986.

In 1987, Liam made a conscious decision to move to Hollywood in order to star in high-profile roles. That year, he starred alongside Cher and Dennis Quaid in Suspect. The role brought Liam critical applause, but it was 1990's Darkman that would bring his name to public attention.

He has starred in a number of notable roles including Oskar Schindler in Schindler's List, Michael Collins in Michael Collins, Jean Valjean in Les Misérables, Qui-Gon Jinn in Star Wars (the film Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace and an episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars), Alfred Kinsey in Kinsey, Ra's al Ghul in Batman Begins and The Dark Knight Rises as well as the voice of Aslan in The Chronicles of Narnia film series and The Grey as John Ottway

He starred in other notable films such as Excalibur, The Dead Pool, Nell, Rob Roy, The Haunting, Love Actually, Kingdom of Heaven, Taken, Clash of the Titans, The A-Team, and Unknown, as well as smaller arthouse films (e.g. Deception, Breakfast on Pluto, Chloe). He was ranked at number 69 on Empire magazine's 100 greatest movie stars of all time in 1997.

Liam was married to actress Natasha Richardson from 3 July 1994, until her death on 18 March 2009, when she suffered a severe head injury in a skiing accident at the Mont Tremblant Resort, in Quebec. Natasha and Liam had two sons: Michael and Daniel. 

Liam lives in Millbrook, New York. In August 2004 he and his wife purchased an additional16 acres next to their estate.

A heavy smoker earlier in his career, Liam has since quit smoking. When he took the role of Hannibal for the 2010 film adaptation of The A-Team, Neeson had reservations about smoking cigars (which is a signature trait of the Hannibal character) in the film due to being an ex-smoker, but agreed to keep that personality trait of Hannibal intact for the film.

In August 2009, Liam stated on ABC's Good Morning America that he had been naturalised as a United States citizen.

A January 2012 article in The Sun indicated that Liam has thought of converting to Islam. This reportedly followed a period of filming in Istanbul, Turkey and hearing the call to prayer.

Pray for Liam, this week, that God will do something miraculous to reveal to him His Son and the grace and freedom available through His death.

We are excited to include young people in our prayers for Hollywood! Join us in praying for the kids and the adults who influence kids in film, television and music.  Just print out whichever calendar pertains to you and pass it on to your families, church leaders and Bible study leaders and pray for the young people in the entertainment industry. Also, email us with any other people you'd like to see added to future month's calendars at info@hpnemail.org.

To download the HPN Kids Feb. 2012 Prayer Calendar:  Click Here
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(PDF for easy printing. 5.0MB) Click Here

To download the HPN Teen Feb. 2012 Prayer Calendar:  Click Here
(Smaller JPG version for quick download. 0.5MB)
(PDF for easy printing. 5.0MB) Click Here

We invite you to join us in praying for Hollywood!
As a Hollywood Prayer Network Member you will receive our monthly Prayer Newsletter outlining current prayer requests from Industry Professionals working in Hollywood . You can also view these and other requests on our Prayer Requests page. If you would like to commit to pray for an individual please consider joining our "IPT" or "I to I" Prayer Programs.

God sent His Son into the world, not to condemn Hollywood, but that Hollywood might be saved through Him.” John 3:16 CRV

More Ways To Pray
Separatism, avoidance, organized boycotts, and angry protests all have failed to redeem the media. Seldom are those in the field prayed for. Pray!^® magazine's newest prayer card gives you 21 prayers to pray for the redemption of those in the media and entertainment fields. For more information click here.

Click here to hear why people should pray for Hollywood.

Every Friday, Industry Christians join with Christians who work on Studio Lots, to go on a "prayer walk." These prayer walks happen on a different lot each week. It would be our pleasure to have you join us as we unite and pray for this crazy industry!

It is our passion to see God reach the Arts and Entertainment industry. What better way to influence and love these people, than to use one of the greatest weapons God has given us--PRAYER!!!!

Here's how the system works:
Every Monday we email members information about the studio walk that happening for that week. If interested, members are required to RSVP through email by Thursday. Once the RSVP is received, we respond by emailing the logistical details of the walk, thus confirming the reservation.

We ask all those who are new to the prayer walk to PLEASE take a moment to thoroughly read the Prayer Walk Guidelines before attending the walk.

To join you must first be a logged-in HPN member.

If you are interested, please contact Caren at: Caren@hpnemail.org

Prayer Walks are currently held at the following studios:
Sony
Warner Brothers
Disney

At each studio, there is a fellow brother or sister in Christ who acts as the Prayer Walk host. Because so much of the industry is very antagonistic towards Christians and any Christian activity, we feel it VERY IMPORTANT not to jeopardize, in any way, the jobs of our Christian host at each studio or the Prayer Walk itself.

More Ways to Pray
If you work on Friday's you can still join us in prayer. Take your lunch hour, or simply a few minutes at your desk to pray with us!

To join the "Prayer Walks" Email List, click here.

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