10/02/07 week of Epiphany 5
[Please remember this is a sort of "menu" from which to select. No one has to pray it all]
If you would like these meditations to come directly to your in box, please click here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KnitternunMeditation/
Collect
Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins, and give us the liberty of that abundant life which you have made known to us in your Son our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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Today's Scripture http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/
Ps 87, 90 * 136; Isaiah 61:10-62:5; 2 Tim 4:1-8; Mark 10:46-52
++++++++++
From Forward Day by Day: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm
Isaiah 61:10-62:5. For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up...
I can hardly wait. The seed catalogues that arrived last month are dog-eared from my poring over them. A spate of unseasonably warm weather has roused the daffodils early from their winter's sleep, bringing up their stiff green shoots--in early February! It's almost more than I can bear.
Of course, winter isn't really over yet. We can have some rough sledding in February and March, and I distinctly remember a foot of snow one Easter morning some years ago. But the green shoots and the unexpected blooms give their hopeful testimony: life will again come from the earth. Death is not forever--far from it. The cycle of living continues, on and on. We can count on it.
This is not to say that I myself will go on and on. The springtime of my life is already a distant memory--my life is in its early autumn by now, I guess, and winter looms ahead. And then the earthly part of me will come to an end, as surely as any flower fades and drops to the ground.
And I will change form, just as the flower does: it becomes part of the earth again, nourishing new life for the next season. As my life will nourish the lives of those who come after me, if I live it well.
++++++++++
Today we remember: http://satucket.com/lectionary/Calendar.htm
St. Scholastica, sister of St. Benedict
http://saintbenedict.org/stscholastica.htm
++++++++++
Today in the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we pray for the Diocese of Maseno West (Kenya)
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm
++++++++++
Carmelite.com: Reflections http://www.carmelite.com/spirituality/reflection.php
Scattering a thousand graces, he passed through these groves in haste, and looking on them as he went, with his glance alone, he clothed them in beauty.
St John of the Cross
Spiritual Canticle, 5.
++++++++++
Reading from the Desert Christians http://www.cin.org/dsrtftin.html
On Hospitality
A brother came to see a certain hermit and, as he was leaving, he said, "Forgive me abba for preventing you from keeping your rule." The hermit replied, "My rule is to welcome you with hospitality and to send you away in peace."
It was said of an old man that he dwelt in Syria on the way to the desert. This was his work: whenever a monk came from the desert, he gave him refreshment with all his heart. Now one day a hermit came and he offered him refreshment. The other did not want to accept it, saying he was fasting. Filled with sorrow, the old man said to him, "Do not despise your servant, I beg you, do not despise me, but let us pray together. Look at the tree which is here; we will follow the way of whichever of us causes it to bend when he kneels on the ground and prays." So the hermit knelt down to pray and nothing happened. Then the hospitable one knelt down and at once the tree bent towards him. Taught by this, they gave thanks to God.
++++++++++
Daily Meditation (Henri Nouwen) http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/
Dying Well
We will all die one day. That is one of the few things we can be sure of. But will we die well? That is less certain. Dying well means dying for others, making our lives fruitful for those we leave behind. The big question, therefore, is not "What can I still do in the years I have left to live?" but "How can I prepare myself for my death so that my life can continue to bear fruit in the generations that will follow me?"
Jesus died well because through dying he sent his Spirit of Love to his friends, who with that Holy Spirit could live better lives. Can we also send the Spirit of Love to our friends when we leave them? Or are we too worried about what we can still do? Dying can become our greatest gift if we prepare ourselves to die well.
++++++++++
From the Principles of the Third Society of St. Francis:
Day Ten - The Third Aim To live simply.
The first Christian surrendered completely to our Lord and recklessly gave
all that they had, offering the world a new vision of a society in which a
fresh attitude was taken towards material possessions. This vision was
renewed by Saint Francis when he chose Lady Poverty as his bride, desiring
that all barriers set up by privilege based on wealth should be overcome by
love. This is the inspiration for the third aim of the Society, to live
simply.
Lord, without you our labour is wasted, but with you all who are weak can
find strength: pour you Spirit on the Society of Saint Francis; give your
labourers a pure intention, patient faith, sufficient success on earth, and
the joy of serving you in heaven; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Leave me alone with God as much as may be.
As the tide draws the waters close in upon the shore,
Make me an island, set apart,
alone with you, God, holy to you.
Then with the turning of the tide
prepare me to carry your presence to the busy world beyond,
the world that rushes in on me
till the waters come again and fold me back to you.
From http://www.prayerfoundation.org/aidans_prayer.htm Visit the website to
discover others who identify with Francis and see the lovely picture that
goes with this poem
++++++++++
Upper Room Daily Reflection http://www.upperroom.org/reflections/
WHAT HAS YOUR ATTENTION at this very moment? This reading? Perhaps, but we all know that we can give modest attention to several things at once. We eat, read, and listen for the phone all at the same time. When our search for something consumes all our energy and all our faculties, everything else fades away and disappears. Even a ringing phone goes unanswered when we are seeking to give answer to another call deep within. What are you searching for that consumes all your energy and attention? The quest for God is a search worthy of such all-consuming passion and energy.
- Rueben P. Job
A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God
From page 375 of A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God by Norman Shawchuck and Rueben P. Job. Cop
+++++++++++
Richard Rohr's Daily Reflection
http://cacradicalgrace.org/getconnected/getconnected_index.html
"Prophets in Your Hometowns"
The prophets had one foot in Israel and one foot outside. So must you have one foot in your faith community and one foot in the world. Always we have to find our love, then give our love away. Sometimes it isn’t easy to give or to see. We must love where we are called to love, and sometimes that means loving people and institutions that really turn us off. The prophets always loved Israel; they were always faithful to her. They believed that the Lord was using Israel to proclaim his presence and love to the world. They didn’t feel they were better than Israel. They knew they had to speak a word of truth to that nation. Although they suffered at the hands of the world, they suffered even more at the hands of Israel.
from The Great Themes of Scripture
++++++++++
From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.
http://www.artsci.villanova.edu/dsteelman/tradition/sources.html
A happy sin
Let all creatures bless you, O Lord, since you are the salvation of all of us. Let your angels bless you, they who are ever valiant executors of your orders, let your armies bless you, as well as your ministers, always ready to follow your instructions. Let all your created works praise you, all over the horizon, as far as your empire stretches out, and together with them, let my soul praise you too. It is said, in Psalm 96, at the very beginning, Oh sing unto the Lord a new song, and indeed your greatness is so special that it deserves to be praised by a new language, a new music, a new song. Your arm became our salvation, your Word became our Jesus. Your very power, your right hand, your strong fortress and castle, became for us a sweet and helpful medicine. You brought your Son Jesus in front of all of us, as our salvation, and by it you made your cause acceptable and accepted by everybody. No one will complain that you let us fall in the past, since you helped so much to retrieve and save us from such an ancient fall. There was guilt, yet the medicine was all-powerful. We may even say that it was a happy sin, since it brought for us the salvation of our Jesus.
Luis de León, O.S.A.,(1527 - 1591), an Augustinian friar, was a poet, mystic, scriptural scholar, and theologian; above all he was a holy man who suffered much for his beliefs. He was the editor of the works of Saint Teresa of Jesus of Avila.
++++++++++
Today's reading from the Rule of St. Benedict http://www.osb.org/rb/
Chapter 8: On the Divine Office During the Night
In the winter time,
that is from the Calends of November until Easter,
the sisters shall rise
at what is calculated to be the eighth hour of the night,
so that they may sleep somewhat longer than half the night
and rise with their rest completed.
And the time that remains after the Night Office
should be spent in study
by those sisters who need a better knowledge of the Psalter
or the lessons.
From Easter to the aforesaid Calends of November,
the hour of rising should be so arranged that the Morning Office,
which is to be said at daybreak,
will follow the Night Office after a very short interval,
during which they may go out for the necessities of nature.
Commentary: http://www.eriebenedictines.org/Pages/INSPIRATION/insights.html
Among the Sayings of the Desert Monastics there is a story that may explain best Benedict's terse, clear instructions on prayer:
Once upon a time the disciples asked Abba Agathon, "Amongst all good works, which is the virtue which requires the greatest effort?" Abba Agathon answered, "I think there is no labor greater than that of prayer to God. For every time we want to pray, our enemies, the demons, want to prevent us, for they know that it is only by turning us from prayer that they can hinder our journey. What ever good work a person undertakes, if they persevere in it, they will attain rest. But prayer is warfare to the last breath."
There are three dimensions of the treatment of prayer in the Rule of Benedict that deserve special attention. In the first place, it is presented immediately after the chapter on humility. In the second place, it is not a treatise on private prayer. In the third place, it is scriptural rather than personal. Prayer is, then, the natural response of people who know their place in the universe. It is not designed to be a psychological comfort zone though surely comfort it must. And lastly, it is an act of community and an act of awareness.
Prayer, as Abba Agathon implies, is hard and taxing and demanding work. It breaks us open to the designs of God for life. It brings great insights and it demands great responses. It is based on the psalms, the very prayers that formed Jesus himself. And, most of all, it is unceasing. Day and night, Benedict says, day and night we must present ourselves before the face of God and beg for the insight and the courage it will take to go the next step.
There are volumes written on the structure and the history of the Divine Office: psalms, scripture readings and prayers that are identified as the official prayer of the church. What is most noteworthy here is not so much the ordering of the parts of the Office which Benedict himself says in another place is not absolute but the demonstration of humanity that undergirds the place of the Divine Office in the life of the monastic. The way Benedict deals with prayer says a great deal about the place of prayer in the life of us all even fifteen centuries later.
At first reading, the prayer life of Benedict's communities seems to be inhumanly rigorous and totally incompatible with modern life, either religious or lay. The monks are "to arise at the eighth hour of the night," the Rule says and that is at least impossible for most people if not downright fanatical or destructive. It is important for a modern reader to realize, however, that the Roman night in a world without electric lights was computed from 6:00 pm to 6:00 am, from sundown to sunup. In this culture, in other words, the monks went naturally to bed at about 6:00 pm. To wake at the eighth hour, then, was to wake at about 2:00 am, after eight full hours of sleep and the natural restoration of the body, to use the remaining hours before the beginning of the workday in prayer and study. The difference between us and the early monastic communities is that we extend our days at the end of them. We go to bed hours after sundown. They extended their days at the beginning of them; they got up hours before sunrise. The only question, given the fact that we both extend the workday hours, is what we do with the time. We stay up and watch television or go to parties or prolong our office hours. We fill our lives with the mundane. They got up to pray and to study the scriptures. They filled their souls with the sacred.
++++++++++
"THE LIMITATIONS OF LIKE MINDS" AND "NEW TOOLS, MORE FOOD AND A LOT MORE TIME"
Today's eMo is really two different meditations on texts that will be read in many churches this Sunday. The first is the usual sermon preparation eMo. The second, intended for preachers who wish to focus their congregations' attention on the Church's service to the poor and those who suffer from the effects of war or natural disaster, explores the ministry of Episcopal Relief and Development. As with all the eMos, preachers and teachers are welcome to borrow, with the usual attribution. No further permission is necessary.
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The Limitations of Like Minds
Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets.
Luke 6:22
Respect for conscience is the great gift of Anglican life together. You are not me, and you never have to become me. You have your own journey, and it is not mine. Together we serve the God who created us both, and we can do so even if we disagree, and even if our disagreement is about very important things. We do not have to be a community of like-minded people. We can just agree to serve.
A community of like-minded people has no internal method of self-correction and self-examination -- the most it can do is monitor conformity to unquestioned norms. The friction of argument and the energy it produces is the potent fuel of ideas, in the human community. All our intellectual progress has been accomplished by questioning assumptions.
If an orthodoxy can bear such scrutiny, it remains as it was. If it cannot, it changes. So it has ever been. A questioning mind is not the devil's work. It is one of the fruits of baptism. We pray for it at the font.
That is why we have married priests, why we have women priests. It is why we have restored the ministry of deacons in the Church. It is why the disabled are not barred from serving in ordained ministry. It is why women who have recently given birth are not considered ritually unclean. It is why Christians need not observe the large and complex corpus of Jewish law. It is why the Church is very different in our century from what it was in the 19th. Or in the 16th. Or the 4th.
This is not a betrayal of principle. It is the way human beings live. We live in history as fish swim in water, and history only moves forward. The realm of God to which we look is without time, but the world in which we now live is bound to history. Eyes open, brain in gear and spirit available for instruction, we move with its current.
Don't try to abandon history, for you cannot, not while you are here. Don't try to stop it. Instead, talk to it. Look at it. Listen to it. The human family has many ways of being in the world, and all are instructive in some way. It is the height of hubris to think that we know all there is to know about God's ways because we understand our own. It cuts God out of our story, and makes it a very local story indeed. A story about us alone.
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Jeremiah 17:5-10
I Corinthians 15:12-20
Luke 6:17-26
Psalm 1
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And here is the ERD meditation:
New Tools, More Food and a Lot More Time
Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled.
Luke 6:21
It isn't that the people of the Philippines don't know how to farm -- two-thirds of the rural population of the Philippines makes a living by subsistence farming. They've cultivated the rich soil of those beautiful islands for millennia, using methods handed down from generation to generation.
But there are immense cities there now, as there were not in ancient times. The water has changed: more demands are placed upon it, and ancient sanitation methods falter under the weight of a larger population, a reality felt in rural areas as well as in urban ones. And the natural disasters to which the region is vulnerable make their deadly appearance regularly, sweeping away entire crops and leaving farm families with nothing to show for months of backbreaking work. Forty percent of the population of the Philippines lives in poverty.
But in the villages of Basao and Makilo in the northern region of the Philippines, Episcopal Relief and Development has assisted the diocese in the building of an irrigation system that will allow for two crops per year, instead of just one, and render land that has been non-arable useful and productive. With our support, ERD has also provided mechanized mills and threshing equipment there and in other villages, making it possible for families to process the grain they raise much more quickly than they could when the women and children had to pound it all by hand.
More food, processed more quickly. More to eat and more to sell. A machine that can give a hardworking family the precious gift of time: time for other kinds of work, time to go to school. So that their minds can be nourished, as well as their bodies, and their future can be the richer, wider one for which their parents long.
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To learn more about ERD's work, or to make a donation, visit http://www.er-d.org/ or telephone 1--800-334-7626,ext 5129.
Copyright © 2007 Barbara Crafton - http://www.geraniumfarm.org
If you would like these meditations to come directly to your in box, please click here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KnitternunMeditation/
Collect
Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins, and give us the liberty of that abundant life which you have made known to us in your Son our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
++++++++++
Today's Scripture http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/
Ps 87, 90 * 136; Isaiah 61:10-62:5; 2 Tim 4:1-8; Mark 10:46-52
++++++++++
From Forward Day by Day: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm
Isaiah 61:10-62:5. For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up...
I can hardly wait. The seed catalogues that arrived last month are dog-eared from my poring over them. A spate of unseasonably warm weather has roused the daffodils early from their winter's sleep, bringing up their stiff green shoots--in early February! It's almost more than I can bear.
Of course, winter isn't really over yet. We can have some rough sledding in February and March, and I distinctly remember a foot of snow one Easter morning some years ago. But the green shoots and the unexpected blooms give their hopeful testimony: life will again come from the earth. Death is not forever--far from it. The cycle of living continues, on and on. We can count on it.
This is not to say that I myself will go on and on. The springtime of my life is already a distant memory--my life is in its early autumn by now, I guess, and winter looms ahead. And then the earthly part of me will come to an end, as surely as any flower fades and drops to the ground.
And I will change form, just as the flower does: it becomes part of the earth again, nourishing new life for the next season. As my life will nourish the lives of those who come after me, if I live it well.
++++++++++
Today we remember: http://satucket.com/lectionary/Calendar.htm
St. Scholastica, sister of St. Benedict
http://saintbenedict.org/stscholastica.htm
++++++++++
Today in the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we pray for the Diocese of Maseno West (Kenya)
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm
++++++++++
Carmelite.com: Reflections http://www.carmelite.com/spirituality/reflection.php
Scattering a thousand graces, he passed through these groves in haste, and looking on them as he went, with his glance alone, he clothed them in beauty.
St John of the Cross
Spiritual Canticle, 5.
++++++++++
Reading from the Desert Christians http://www.cin.org/dsrtftin.html
On Hospitality
A brother came to see a certain hermit and, as he was leaving, he said, "Forgive me abba for preventing you from keeping your rule." The hermit replied, "My rule is to welcome you with hospitality and to send you away in peace."
It was said of an old man that he dwelt in Syria on the way to the desert. This was his work: whenever a monk came from the desert, he gave him refreshment with all his heart. Now one day a hermit came and he offered him refreshment. The other did not want to accept it, saying he was fasting. Filled with sorrow, the old man said to him, "Do not despise your servant, I beg you, do not despise me, but let us pray together. Look at the tree which is here; we will follow the way of whichever of us causes it to bend when he kneels on the ground and prays." So the hermit knelt down to pray and nothing happened. Then the hospitable one knelt down and at once the tree bent towards him. Taught by this, they gave thanks to God.
++++++++++
Daily Meditation (Henri Nouwen) http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/
Dying Well
We will all die one day. That is one of the few things we can be sure of. But will we die well? That is less certain. Dying well means dying for others, making our lives fruitful for those we leave behind. The big question, therefore, is not "What can I still do in the years I have left to live?" but "How can I prepare myself for my death so that my life can continue to bear fruit in the generations that will follow me?"
Jesus died well because through dying he sent his Spirit of Love to his friends, who with that Holy Spirit could live better lives. Can we also send the Spirit of Love to our friends when we leave them? Or are we too worried about what we can still do? Dying can become our greatest gift if we prepare ourselves to die well.
++++++++++
From the Principles of the Third Society of St. Francis:
Day Ten - The Third Aim To live simply.
The first Christian surrendered completely to our Lord and recklessly gave
all that they had, offering the world a new vision of a society in which a
fresh attitude was taken towards material possessions. This vision was
renewed by Saint Francis when he chose Lady Poverty as his bride, desiring
that all barriers set up by privilege based on wealth should be overcome by
love. This is the inspiration for the third aim of the Society, to live
simply.
Lord, without you our labour is wasted, but with you all who are weak can
find strength: pour you Spirit on the Society of Saint Francis; give your
labourers a pure intention, patient faith, sufficient success on earth, and
the joy of serving you in heaven; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Leave me alone with God as much as may be.
As the tide draws the waters close in upon the shore,
Make me an island, set apart,
alone with you, God, holy to you.
Then with the turning of the tide
prepare me to carry your presence to the busy world beyond,
the world that rushes in on me
till the waters come again and fold me back to you.
From http://www.prayerfoundation.org/aidans_prayer.htm Visit the website to
discover others who identify with Francis and see the lovely picture that
goes with this poem
++++++++++
Upper Room Daily Reflection http://www.upperroom.org/reflections/
WHAT HAS YOUR ATTENTION at this very moment? This reading? Perhaps, but we all know that we can give modest attention to several things at once. We eat, read, and listen for the phone all at the same time. When our search for something consumes all our energy and all our faculties, everything else fades away and disappears. Even a ringing phone goes unanswered when we are seeking to give answer to another call deep within. What are you searching for that consumes all your energy and attention? The quest for God is a search worthy of such all-consuming passion and energy.
- Rueben P. Job
A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God
From page 375 of A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God by Norman Shawchuck and Rueben P. Job. Cop
+++++++++++
Richard Rohr's Daily Reflection
http://cacradicalgrace.org/getconnected/getconnected_index.html
"Prophets in Your Hometowns"
The prophets had one foot in Israel and one foot outside. So must you have one foot in your faith community and one foot in the world. Always we have to find our love, then give our love away. Sometimes it isn’t easy to give or to see. We must love where we are called to love, and sometimes that means loving people and institutions that really turn us off. The prophets always loved Israel; they were always faithful to her. They believed that the Lord was using Israel to proclaim his presence and love to the world. They didn’t feel they were better than Israel. They knew they had to speak a word of truth to that nation. Although they suffered at the hands of the world, they suffered even more at the hands of Israel.
from The Great Themes of Scripture
++++++++++
From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.
http://www.artsci.villanova.edu/dsteelman/tradition/sources.html
A happy sin
Let all creatures bless you, O Lord, since you are the salvation of all of us. Let your angels bless you, they who are ever valiant executors of your orders, let your armies bless you, as well as your ministers, always ready to follow your instructions. Let all your created works praise you, all over the horizon, as far as your empire stretches out, and together with them, let my soul praise you too. It is said, in Psalm 96, at the very beginning, Oh sing unto the Lord a new song, and indeed your greatness is so special that it deserves to be praised by a new language, a new music, a new song. Your arm became our salvation, your Word became our Jesus. Your very power, your right hand, your strong fortress and castle, became for us a sweet and helpful medicine. You brought your Son Jesus in front of all of us, as our salvation, and by it you made your cause acceptable and accepted by everybody. No one will complain that you let us fall in the past, since you helped so much to retrieve and save us from such an ancient fall. There was guilt, yet the medicine was all-powerful. We may even say that it was a happy sin, since it brought for us the salvation of our Jesus.
Luis de León, O.S.A.,(1527 - 1591), an Augustinian friar, was a poet, mystic, scriptural scholar, and theologian; above all he was a holy man who suffered much for his beliefs. He was the editor of the works of Saint Teresa of Jesus of Avila.
++++++++++
Today's reading from the Rule of St. Benedict http://www.osb.org/rb/
Chapter 8: On the Divine Office During the Night
In the winter time,
that is from the Calends of November until Easter,
the sisters shall rise
at what is calculated to be the eighth hour of the night,
so that they may sleep somewhat longer than half the night
and rise with their rest completed.
And the time that remains after the Night Office
should be spent in study
by those sisters who need a better knowledge of the Psalter
or the lessons.
From Easter to the aforesaid Calends of November,
the hour of rising should be so arranged that the Morning Office,
which is to be said at daybreak,
will follow the Night Office after a very short interval,
during which they may go out for the necessities of nature.
Commentary: http://www.eriebenedictines.org/Pages/INSPIRATION/insights.html
Among the Sayings of the Desert Monastics there is a story that may explain best Benedict's terse, clear instructions on prayer:
Once upon a time the disciples asked Abba Agathon, "Amongst all good works, which is the virtue which requires the greatest effort?" Abba Agathon answered, "I think there is no labor greater than that of prayer to God. For every time we want to pray, our enemies, the demons, want to prevent us, for they know that it is only by turning us from prayer that they can hinder our journey. What ever good work a person undertakes, if they persevere in it, they will attain rest. But prayer is warfare to the last breath."
There are three dimensions of the treatment of prayer in the Rule of Benedict that deserve special attention. In the first place, it is presented immediately after the chapter on humility. In the second place, it is not a treatise on private prayer. In the third place, it is scriptural rather than personal. Prayer is, then, the natural response of people who know their place in the universe. It is not designed to be a psychological comfort zone though surely comfort it must. And lastly, it is an act of community and an act of awareness.
Prayer, as Abba Agathon implies, is hard and taxing and demanding work. It breaks us open to the designs of God for life. It brings great insights and it demands great responses. It is based on the psalms, the very prayers that formed Jesus himself. And, most of all, it is unceasing. Day and night, Benedict says, day and night we must present ourselves before the face of God and beg for the insight and the courage it will take to go the next step.
There are volumes written on the structure and the history of the Divine Office: psalms, scripture readings and prayers that are identified as the official prayer of the church. What is most noteworthy here is not so much the ordering of the parts of the Office which Benedict himself says in another place is not absolute but the demonstration of humanity that undergirds the place of the Divine Office in the life of the monastic. The way Benedict deals with prayer says a great deal about the place of prayer in the life of us all even fifteen centuries later.
At first reading, the prayer life of Benedict's communities seems to be inhumanly rigorous and totally incompatible with modern life, either religious or lay. The monks are "to arise at the eighth hour of the night," the Rule says and that is at least impossible for most people if not downright fanatical or destructive. It is important for a modern reader to realize, however, that the Roman night in a world without electric lights was computed from 6:00 pm to 6:00 am, from sundown to sunup. In this culture, in other words, the monks went naturally to bed at about 6:00 pm. To wake at the eighth hour, then, was to wake at about 2:00 am, after eight full hours of sleep and the natural restoration of the body, to use the remaining hours before the beginning of the workday in prayer and study. The difference between us and the early monastic communities is that we extend our days at the end of them. We go to bed hours after sundown. They extended their days at the beginning of them; they got up hours before sunrise. The only question, given the fact that we both extend the workday hours, is what we do with the time. We stay up and watch television or go to parties or prolong our office hours. We fill our lives with the mundane. They got up to pray and to study the scriptures. They filled their souls with the sacred.
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"THE LIMITATIONS OF LIKE MINDS" AND "NEW TOOLS, MORE FOOD AND A LOT MORE TIME"
Today's eMo is really two different meditations on texts that will be read in many churches this Sunday. The first is the usual sermon preparation eMo. The second, intended for preachers who wish to focus their congregations' attention on the Church's service to the poor and those who suffer from the effects of war or natural disaster, explores the ministry of Episcopal Relief and Development. As with all the eMos, preachers and teachers are welcome to borrow, with the usual attribution. No further permission is necessary.
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The Limitations of Like Minds
Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets.
Luke 6:22
Respect for conscience is the great gift of Anglican life together. You are not me, and you never have to become me. You have your own journey, and it is not mine. Together we serve the God who created us both, and we can do so even if we disagree, and even if our disagreement is about very important things. We do not have to be a community of like-minded people. We can just agree to serve.
A community of like-minded people has no internal method of self-correction and self-examination -- the most it can do is monitor conformity to unquestioned norms. The friction of argument and the energy it produces is the potent fuel of ideas, in the human community. All our intellectual progress has been accomplished by questioning assumptions.
If an orthodoxy can bear such scrutiny, it remains as it was. If it cannot, it changes. So it has ever been. A questioning mind is not the devil's work. It is one of the fruits of baptism. We pray for it at the font.
That is why we have married priests, why we have women priests. It is why we have restored the ministry of deacons in the Church. It is why the disabled are not barred from serving in ordained ministry. It is why women who have recently given birth are not considered ritually unclean. It is why Christians need not observe the large and complex corpus of Jewish law. It is why the Church is very different in our century from what it was in the 19th. Or in the 16th. Or the 4th.
This is not a betrayal of principle. It is the way human beings live. We live in history as fish swim in water, and history only moves forward. The realm of God to which we look is without time, but the world in which we now live is bound to history. Eyes open, brain in gear and spirit available for instruction, we move with its current.
Don't try to abandon history, for you cannot, not while you are here. Don't try to stop it. Instead, talk to it. Look at it. Listen to it. The human family has many ways of being in the world, and all are instructive in some way. It is the height of hubris to think that we know all there is to know about God's ways because we understand our own. It cuts God out of our story, and makes it a very local story indeed. A story about us alone.
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Jeremiah 17:5-10
I Corinthians 15:12-20
Luke 6:17-26
Psalm 1
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And here is the ERD meditation:
New Tools, More Food and a Lot More Time
Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled.
Luke 6:21
It isn't that the people of the Philippines don't know how to farm -- two-thirds of the rural population of the Philippines makes a living by subsistence farming. They've cultivated the rich soil of those beautiful islands for millennia, using methods handed down from generation to generation.
But there are immense cities there now, as there were not in ancient times. The water has changed: more demands are placed upon it, and ancient sanitation methods falter under the weight of a larger population, a reality felt in rural areas as well as in urban ones. And the natural disasters to which the region is vulnerable make their deadly appearance regularly, sweeping away entire crops and leaving farm families with nothing to show for months of backbreaking work. Forty percent of the population of the Philippines lives in poverty.
But in the villages of Basao and Makilo in the northern region of the Philippines, Episcopal Relief and Development has assisted the diocese in the building of an irrigation system that will allow for two crops per year, instead of just one, and render land that has been non-arable useful and productive. With our support, ERD has also provided mechanized mills and threshing equipment there and in other villages, making it possible for families to process the grain they raise much more quickly than they could when the women and children had to pound it all by hand.
More food, processed more quickly. More to eat and more to sell. A machine that can give a hardworking family the precious gift of time: time for other kinds of work, time to go to school. So that their minds can be nourished, as well as their bodies, and their future can be the richer, wider one for which their parents long.
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To learn more about ERD's work, or to make a donation, visit http://www.er-d.org/ or telephone 1--800-334-7626,ext 5129.
Copyright © 2007 Barbara Crafton - http://www.geraniumfarm.org
posted by Gloriamarie Amalfitano @ 10:01 AM
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