Tag: prayers

Thoughts and Prayers

Another day.
Another mass shooting.
We…
Or, at least, I…
Can barely keep up.
If we were really praying
Really sending our thoughts and prayers
We would be down on our knees
Nearly every minute of every day.
But we are not.

We send our thoughts and prayers
To the victims and their families.
To their friends and their classmates.
We send our thoughts and prayers to the first responders
And to the doctors and nurses who wait, already tired, in the emergency rooms.
Sometimes we may even remember to pray for each other.
For who knows where it will happen tomorrow.

But there is one prayer we dare not pray.
And that is this.
God, help us find a way to make these killings stop.
Because if we prayed that prayer it would mean that there is some way.
And, because God only works through the likes of you and me
We might be the ones who, alongside God, would have to work to make it stop.

I Don’t Even Know Where to Begin

I don’t even know where to begin.
Or, how to name what I am feeling.

Writing off what has been said and done as just politics doesn’t work.
Won’t work.
The rhetoric ripped at the fabric of who we are or hope to be.
And added to the anger.
And to the hate.
And to the fear.
It has done its best
And succeeded
In setting you against me
And me against you.

Why is it always the most vulnerable who get hurt the most?
Those who have seen jobs disappear with only minimum wage jobs remaining.
Those who come to this country and do the work which those who came before won’t do because even those jobs are better than what they left behind.
Those who put their children to bed hungry.
Those who skin color does not match mine.
Those who look towards tomorrow with little or no hope.
Those whose sexual orientation is different than mine.
Those who feel something important has been lost as so much has changed.

Because of who I am
And the color of my skin
And the privilege I enjoy
I will be okay.
At least for the short term.
At least if I only worry about me.
And not about you.
But, that will only last for a little while
Because in the end
Like it or not
We are in this together.
We either figure it out or we lose it.

I often end the prayers I lead with these words.
Let our lives follow where our prayers first lead.
Today I pray the strength to put one foot in front of the other.
Today I pray for those who woke up this morning afraid.
Today I pray for those who walk through today with tears in their eyes.
Today I pray for those whose hopes last night were realized.
Today I pray for leadership.

Let my life follow where my prayers first lead.

The Practice of the Presence of God

I first read the book The Practice of the Presence of God when I was in college and trying to figure out what I believed and to have my faith grow up to be more than what I knew as a child. In the book, Brother Lawrence learns that he prays best not in the chapel, but while he is washing dishes in the monastery kitchen. When I first read the book the insight that you could pray while washing dishes was a helpful lesson for me. Before that prayer had always been what the minister did or what people did in church. That I could pray washing dishes or going for a walk or sitting on the porch helped me to learn what it meant to pray. For me to pray.

Now that I am older, I get praying while washing the dishes.
Praying then is easy.
There is something about the warm water and that simple act which slows me down and helps me to pay attention to the moment and to what I am doing which is something of what prayer is all about. I don’t need to learn to practice the presence of God in moments like that. What I need to learn is to practice the presence of God when I am on the phone for two hours with the customer service at Sears who want to send a third technician to look at our four year old refrigerator that has not been working now for two weeks or when I am being asked to jump through hoops because somewhere along the way someone thought that would be a good thing to ask everyone to do.

In other words, I need to learn to pray and to practice the presence of God in most of the other moments of my life.

A Sunday Morning Prayer Good For Any Day

Prayer is an opening of the self so that the God can break in and make us new. Prayer unmasks. Prayer converts. Prayer impels. Prayer sustains us on the way. (I read this this week, but forget where.)

Our hopes.
Our dreams.
Our tears.
Our love.
Are all prayers, O God.
Sometimes we wrap them words.
Most of the time not.
Always they are held carefully and deeply in our heart and mind and soul.
Then pushed out towards you;
And towards those whom we love;
And to those who find themselves in need;
And into the world entrusted now to our care and keeping.
We take this moment;
Just as it is and just as we are;
To open up our hearts;
And to be open to your presence;
And in whatever we we might or are able to pray.

A Sunday Prayer

Here we are, O God, just as we are.
Strong.
Weak.
Certain.
Searching.
Celebrating.
Sorrowful.
Hurting.
Hopeful.
Or, some mixture of some or all of these.
But just as we are is all that is needed, isn’t it, O God?
To be present and to say:
Here I am.
For in the moment we whisper those words there You are.
Just as You have always been.
And as we lift our head and look beyond the circle of our own lives we see and recognize all those others who fall within the circle of Your love and our I turns to We and we say, “Here we are.” and in that moment we pray.
Here I am, O God.
Here we are.
Amen.

Christmas Still

Here we are, again, O God.
And while Christmas has come and gone in the world out there,
And so many have moved on to what comes next;
Here it is Christmas still.
For all that we have seen and heard…
For all that has been given to us…
For all that we have to ponder in our own hearts;
About the wonder and meaning and mystery of the season…
We give you thanks.

Help to create some space in our lives so that some part of all of this finds its way deep into our hearts and minds and souls so that our eyes are open a bit more and our hearts are open a bit more so we begin to see the world a bit more like you see the world; see each other a bit more like the way you see each of us.

We pray that it might be so.

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Several things I believe: