Daily Devotional 22 February 2012

Daily Devotional - Morning

At the start of day or before you start work, perhaps you might like to join in with these thoughts and prayers. If you do, find a quiet place, take time to be calm and centred; focus on the still small voice of calm within, finding a sacred space amidst the noise of the world.

Spirit of Community, in which we share and find strength and common purpose, we turn out minds and hearts towards one another seeking to bring into our circle of concern all who need our love and support. Remind us that we are all part of a web of life, that makes us one with the you and with each other.

As we start our busy working day, may we find the grace to see the Divine image reflected in all those people who we will meet this day; may we find the strength to always bear a loving witness and to do what we know is right.

Perhaps you might like to pause here for your own private prayers and thoughts for yourself and for others; for situations around world or people and places only known to you.

Welcoming and vulnerable God, whose outrageous love embraces all of creation and challenges us to our foundation, dwell in our crowded hearts, our steaming bathrooms, messy kitchens, and offices full of things to be done. Shake us from our complacency into action, as we venture our lives courageously towards hope and light, at once fragile, and rooted. Amen.

After work, or at the end of the day

Perhaps you might like to join with these or similar words, if you feel able, at the end of the working day or before sleep.

Blessed spirit of life we give thanks for this day and all that it held; all those people we met and situations we encountered. Faces in the street and in the work place, friends yet to be rather than strangers. May we be thankful.

If you feel able, you might like to use these words in your personal devotion, or use them as inspiration for your own thoughts, prayer or meditation.

As our work ends and the daylight fades, may we confess our shortcomings and give thanks for all that we have achieved; for all that is good and for all that we have, rather than strive for what we think we need.

You might like to close your devotion with either or both of the following.

God, who is the mystery around us, the spirit within us, and the love between us, help us to know you, to know you more with every breath we take, with every pulse of our blood’s circulation, with every glimpse of your essence, as the essence of all things.

May we, in the silence of the night, rest easy and feel restored when the morning light breaks. Amen.

A prayer for Splodge

I have loved you from the day you came into my life,
and now it is time for me to let you go.

You taught me how the universe is founded upon love;

you were shown love and responded the only the only way you knew how.

With love.

My the measure of that love be reflected in the ocean of tears shed for you.
I could not watch you suffer,
I could not see you in pain.
Now you are free.
Your body is no longer sick,
or weak, or hurting.
Now you can run with the others,
playing and hunting as wild things do.
Because I loved you,
I had to let you go.
You will live forever in my heart.

Joseph Hanson

Joseph Hanson (1774-1811) was a Unitarian, political Radical and so-called 'Weaver's Friend', who through his short life was persecuted for his faith and politics by the 'powers that be'. I'm sure there is a sermon in here somehwere. The more one reads about Unitarians in the Napoleonic Period the more one admires them for holding to their faith and principles amidst persecution (especially since to hold the Unitarian view point was illegal and punishable by hanging until 1813).

Anyway, enjoy this:

http://www.mcrh.mmu.ac.uk/pubs/pdf/mrhr_05i_little.pdf

Faith and Belief

Some would say that  faith is the same as belief.  But that’s a mistake.  It’s a mistake the church has made, along with other religions.  It led to a situation where belief became a test of faith; and there were dire consequences for those who failed the test by not believing the right things.  They were subjected to the cruellest torture, and then consigned to eternal damnation if they didn’t change their minds.
This conflation of faith and belief has caused religious chaos across the whole world.  It resulted in pogroms, crusades and many forms of religious extremism, including the latest manifestation of suicide bombers.
So faith needs to be seen as much more than just belief.  Belief is an intellectual activity of the mind: faith is a commitment of the heart.  Faith is better understood in terms of TRUST; and so there will always be an element of risk about it, rather than certainty.

If you have faith in someone, you don’t just believe in their existence, you trust them.  You trust that they will be true to themselves, and live up to the highest claims their own conscience makes upon them.
Faith is a creative energy or power.  It creates relationships.  First of all, it invites you into a relationship with yourself (or rather with your Better Self).  Faith will encourage you to believe in yourself and trust yourself; and even to love yourself, because love is the highest form of this relationship.
Having found a healthy and wholesome relationship with yourself, you will then want to reach out to include others: and this will eventually lead you into the experience of being embraced by the love of the universal Other, that we call God.

Faith is not saying that you believe in the existence of someone called God (as if that would make any difference!).  Nor is it saying that you believe in any so-called ‘statements of faith’.
Faith is not a statement: it’s a commitment – trusting that in spite of all, life has meaning and purpose.  Faith means taking a risk, and living in the light of it; loving yourself and loving others; and as a result, experiencing the love of God who, it seems, is also trusting us to be true to ourselves.                                                                                                   

We are not worthy?

In the gym the other day, whilst doing a 5K metre row -  my favourite/usual place for finding inspiration (perhaps due to increased blood flow to the brain) I started to ponder on the effect of the notion of "Original Sin" on society.

This notion of "You/We are not worthy" is all pervavise: Advertising hoardings shout it in 20 foot high letters "To be worthy look like us/belike us/have this stuff " As though somehow we as people are incomplete and not worthy unless we have a six pack, a new car and the lastest shiny stuff. The Church does the same thing. In the Book of Common Prayer is the line "We are not worthy even to pick up a crumb from under your table." We are all "miserable sinners". Imperfect, not good enough, not worthy. Its all around us! Negativity in = negativity out.

No wonder people have low self esteem! No wonder people think they find happiness from the latest shiny things and hair do.

But yet.....but yet is the latest hair do and having the newest and most "stuff" actually healthy? Is the assertion of the BCP healthy? I dont think so. It tells us that we are somehow, fundementally flawed, flawed by our very nature of our being and only by the ministrations of the church or commercialism can we be saved and be happy.

As  Unitartian, of course, I do not believe in "Original Sin". I believe in Original Blessing. Adam and Eve are jsut a story, like a Kipling "Just-So" story, written at a point in history to explain not literally but in stories and metaphor, why things are the way they are. They are not true nor literal accounts.  That is not to say Sin does not exist. Unitarians and other liberals tend to run away from that word and find it unfashionable. But I think this concept of Sin - literally all that which gets between us and God and ourselves - is important. Whilst Orthodox Christians would suggest that pride is a bad thing - to Catholics a Cardinal Sin - being proud of  yourself, having high self esteem is healthy, but not at the expense of others. To my mind, SIn is best summed up by Terry Pratchett who, through Granny Wetherwax says "There are no shades of grey. Sin...is when you treat others like things". And by extension I would add "yourself". Thus, treating yourself as a thing - as unworthy, as only being happy and fulfilled with the latest clothes and gadget is Sin. Why? Because it blocks out original blessing- the inbuilt capability and capacity within all human beings to be Christ-like. All that "stuff"gets in the way of being ourselves, being truly who we are. We spsend more time striving to be someone else, dreaming, wishing, hoping to be someone else rather than getting to know and love ourselves for the beautiful, fulfilled people we are.

Roger Grainger on Gays and Christianity

Roger quoted the passage where St Paul has his vision, on the temple roof or mountain top and hears that God is Love and all the old laws have passed away.

In his book "The Holy Orafice" Roger describes how OT Jewish Law had very unhealthy/obsessed views with sex - ie some of the wierder stuff in there - but that as Christians we are freed from the laws of Moses and Leviticus to live under new laws, primarily that of Love. St Paul is the major source for Christian morality in the NT - letters to Rome, Corinth etc - but as he had cultural conditioning toward or against various issues (eg homosexuality etc) of course he would say bad things. Indeed, he uses the phrase "Arsen Koitus" - which isnt even Greek, its slang greek and a slang term which meens "anal sex" or "men who have anal sex" in its proper translation but is probably NT slang for "puff". St Paul was of the mind that Gay people chose to be gay - everyone is straigh in his thinking and one choses to be gay. We now know it is more complicated than that!

Jesus Saves – but not like a Computer

So often one sees the words “ Jesus Saves” bandered about, and like the cynic I am, cannot resist adding “with the Pru” or “ but not as good as Wilkinson”. Or whatever pop reference I can come up with.

Many people see Jesus as being the equivalent of a religious Life Boat – literally dragging us, coughing, spluttering, from drowning in our own “sea of sin and iniquity”. Jesus as a life saver. A rescuer. Maybe he is. Maybe he isn't.

But what does the word “Salvation” or “save” in this context mean? Salvation is taken from the Latin salvere meaning “to find wholeness”. In other words, Jesus doesn't save like a goal keeper or a computer programme, saves us from deletion; he's not like the computer in the Dr Who episode 'Silence in the Library'. Instead, he brings us wholeness. Brings a sense of oneness, oneness not only with ourselves but with each other and with God.