Entries tagged with “prayer” from Trans-cendental

I am astounded at the worry that the National Day of Prayer may not get enough presidential support.

First, there's the question of an edict that tells people to pray. Aside from the issue of those who are not believers or who have faith traditions that do not include prayer, of what value is a coerced prayer? Does a prayer need to be from the heart to be authentic?

Second, is this more about being seen in public while praying? By Christian standards (and the call for the National Day of Prayer is largely Christian), Jesus said:

'And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.- Matthew 6:5-8, NRSV

Third, if we are going to have such a day, I would argue it should be a renewal of spiritual practices an caring for others - something we can carry on through the year, rather than a single day to pray.

And fourth, the prayer ought to be about the change that begins within ourselves - a prayer of contrition. As the biggest kid in school, the United States of America injures others: sometimes in cruelty, sometimes in retaliation, sometimes in self-interest, sometimes in trying to protect another, and (probably most often) thoughtlessly or carelessly, unaware of how much impact we have on others.

Remembering President Lincoln's proclamation:

And, in so much as we know that, by His divine law, nations, like individuals, are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us, then to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness. - http://www.quietwaters.org/abraham_lincoln_national_day_of_prayer.htm

I suspect that many who feel this day is important would not want to talk about out sin that "we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own".

Next year, I would like to see a Day of National Self-Examination and Repentance, with a call to spend the other 364 days praying, meditating, thinking, and acting toward being a better world citizen.

Youtube: Vimeo:

The Language of God from United Church of Christ on Vimeo.

What would lead people to call for the death of a person?

Perhaps their pastor.

The Reverend Wiley S. Drake,(First Southern Baptist Church of Buena Park California) asked people to pray for the deaths of the Reverend Barry W. Lynn (United Church of Christ), Joseph Conn and Jeremy Leaming. The three men, leaders of People United for the Separation of Church and State, had filed a complaint with the IRS because Drake had drafted an endorsement of Presidential Hopeful Mike Huckabee on church letterhead.

Perhaps the prayer went something like this:

Heavenly Father, we call upon you to send death upon the Reverend Barry Lynn. We pray that you would make a widow of his wife, and orphans of his now grown children. We pray that his grandchildren would seek and yet not find him, and that his denomination, the United Church of Christ, would mourn his loss.

As I wrote the above in jest, I found this:

He gave as examples of imprecatory prayer:

"Persecute them. ... Let them be put to shame and perish."

"Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow."

"Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg."

 - http://www.civilbrights.net/node/4673


I am overwhelmed by shame: shame that a member of the body of Christ has called out "I have no need of you" to other members, shame that an ordained minister has cried to God not for blessing but for punishment for men and their families.

Not all Christians are like this.

I promise.


References:

• http://pietyandpolitics.com/3/barry/
• http://www.civilbrights.net/node/4673
• http://www.auok.org/who_is_barry_lynn.htm

I'm in seminary because I have an irresistible, irrefusable call to ministry. Despite the fact that I would not choose myself for such a vocation, I cannot seem to resist the compelling force to walk this path. And, rather than telling me how foolish I am, many people who know me encourage me to persevere, saying they see in me something that tells them I have a true calling. Yet every time I try to follow this path, I hit insurmountable obstacles.

When I finally realize how impossible this is for me, a divorced, transsexual lesbian (now in my forties), with yet somewhat traditional and orthodox theology, I come to my senses and stop.

And then comes the intense feeling of loss. Some time later, perhaps six months or a year, I realize I cannot say no to this call. No matter how difficult, how impossible, how ridiculous it is, it is what I must do.


Now I have hit another immovable object. I have to stop. And yet the call is an unstoppable force.


I know the fault is in me. Either I am failing to understand how God is speaking to me, or I am failing in walking the path God has set before me.

And it makes me very sad.


I do not blame God. I blame myself for the failure - even for the failure to see where I have failed.

I cry out for help. I pray that God will grant me whatever I need to do God's will - whatever that will may be. I pray I will be made into the person God has dreamed me to be.

I pray for wisdom to know which way I should go - not the destination, but for the place to plant my next step.

I pray for the humility to accept whatever task to which I may be set.

I pray for the courage to do whatever I must do.

I pray for the strength to overcome the obstacles which I must overcome.

I pray for the acceptance that there are obstacles I was never meant to overcome.

And I pray that my love would always increase, to always care for the others I would find on my way, and for the grace to forgive those who I feel have harmed me, no matter how I felt I was harmed.


I don't know what to do, but at least I have the humility to admit that.