Category: prayer

fragments & fractals

wonderfulexchange8 Comments

A Sunday morning without church feels very strange indeed — especially since I am feeling well enough to notice the strangeness of it, without being well enough to have coped with doing it all. So, it was with fresh eyes (and deeper need) that I came to morning prayer.

There is such graciousness about the Advent office. Even the set prayers seem to be more spacious and giving. First in the opening prayers:

Blessed are you Sovereign God of all
to you be praise and glory for ever
In your tender compassion
the dawn from on high is breaking upon us
to dispel the lingering shadows of night.

and again:

As we rejoice in the gift of this new day,
so may the light of your presence, O God,
set our hearts on fire with love for you

and then in the wonderful antiphon for the Benedictus:

Like the sun in the morning sky,
the Saviour of the world will dawn;
like rain upon the meadows,
the Christ will come down upon us.

In a season that so often feels frenzied, and after days of thinking ‘how will I ever get it all done?’ it is good to remember the inevitability of Christ’s coming. Its completeness. God’s ability to rain down upon us whether we are ready or not.

And after prayers of light dawning and the promise of drenching grace, I stumbled across a fit image of the wonder of it all. A Mandelbrot set. (thanks to Bishop Alan)

When I was 15, Mandelbrot came to lecture to us. It was one of the most remarkable hours of my life. I knew that I did not understand. But there was just enough understanding, a flickering hope on the edge of my consciousness, that I was enthralled. I have only ever known that feeling again in prayer — that feeling of something (someone) dancing right on the edge of perception, which evaporates as soon as you try too hard to understand.

But of course, when Mandelbrot came to us, we did not have the luxury of computers in every room. If you click on the links below, or go to YouTube and search for Mandelbrot sets, you will find ‘zoom’ videos of carefully coloured fractals. They are stunningly beautiful: infinitely repeating, endlessly variable; Blake’s ‘infinity in the palm of your hand/ and eternity in an hour’.

A Mandelbrot set the size of the Universe

A basic illustration & explanation of Mandelbrot sets

Wikipedia on Mandelbrot (good pictures too)

grace

wonderfulexchange1 Comment

Well, the prayer session went so well, I am now convinced that it had nothing whatsoever to do with my planning.

The last set of sessions I did on prayer (last winter) had so far surpassed expectation that I did not let myself hope that it would ever ‘work’ so well again.  And then today — in a very different group with a different entry point to prayer — God took over again and it all just happened.

It is such an extraordinary feeling when a group suddenly begins to pray.  They trusted each other and shared deeply, despite the mix of old-friends and never-met-befores.  Even the person I though was most likely to prefer a different approach could be seen smiling with sudden humour and compassion at someone else’s story and experience of prayer.  You could see and feel and hear people experiencing something new of God, of themselves, and of the people they were praying for (and with).

Days like this make up for a lot of nonsense in the day to day running of a ‘parish’.

reinventing the wheel

wonderfulexchange10 Comments

One of today’s tasks was to plan a set of prayer workshops that begin tomorrow in one of my congregations. Last minute as always. But I convinced myself that it was right to delay so that I could include a visiting ordinand in the planning process.

So, as darkness fell, I gave her a rough outline of where I was coming from and where I thought the congregation might be coming from, and we went our separate ways to think for 20 minutes, before comparing notes.

Despite the fact that this course has been in the diary for months, I have been struggling to know where to go with it. This is the fifth time I’ve done a course like this on prayer, and I keep hoping that one of these days I will be able to reuse, or at least adapt old material. But each time, I find that I can’t. Although the main goals are the same (encouraging and understanding and practice of prayer as relationship & being-with-God) the process is always different.

And for the first time, I simply didn’t know where to go. I’ve been dithering for weeks. When I sent the ordinand upstairs, I thought I was going to spend a very frustrating 20 minutes going in circles.

But not so. As soon as I picked up a pen and started writing down the obvious (‘prayer as relationship, talking/listening, do something practical, bridge unfamiliar with familiar) it all came pouring out. In ten minutes, I had a fully developed plan and rational for three sessions, including a detailed breakdown of approach and timing for the first week. It came so sure and fast, that I knew my intentions for open dialogue with the ordinand were shattered.

I went through the motions, of course. I listened to her many excellent ideas, and we considered various contexts in which they would be most helpful or most difficult. But by then I was sure that I knew what this congregation needed right now.

It’s reassuring to find that knowledge of a congregation is held in instinct even in moments when all feels adrift.

Now, let us just hope that tomorrow’s session proves me right, and I am not sent back to the drawing board. Instinct can be so beguiling.

undique

wonderfulexchange3 Comments

One of the questions that recurs in Christian life is, ‘where is God in this?’ It is a simple question. It can be an infuriating question. It took me a long time to learn to be thankful for the person who asked me it at the most provoking and irritating times; and even longer to learn to ask it for myself.

As a priest, the ‘where is God in this’ question often hovers around the relationship between what I do and who I am in relation to God. How do you separate out the prayer you need to engage in to grow and sustain a relationship with God from the prayer that is part of what you are called and required to do? How do you find time to read the bible or study theology for its own sake rather than as sermon fodder, teaching resource, or pastoral aid? Where is the line between ‘private’ and ‘professional’? Does it, or should it, exist?

When life gets busy (when isn’t it busy?), it’s too easy to go through the motions — to churn out sermons and discussion plans and agendas and prayers without ever knowing if I’ve connected with God at all. No that’s not right. It isn’t easy at all. Because as soon as I begin to slip down that path, I know it’s wrong. It’s not what I want, what I have chosen or been called to. But it can so easily happen despite that.

So, there is always the question: ‘where is God in this?’ A ruthless quest for honesty and integrity.

But something is just dawning on me on day 9 of my holidays. I am beginning to miss all that stuff that has been driving me crazy. No, I’m not ready to go back to work. No, I haven’t been thinking about my sermon for Sunday. But I am beginning to feel an absence.

And absence is good.

Absence is longing.

And longing provokes prayer and growth and more longing.

Maybe God is in the endless round of sermons more than I realise. Maybe all the things that seem to get in the way of God — or get in my way of God — are indeed a part of how God gives himself, part of my learning faithfulness.

Of course, I would have claimed to know that all along.
But sometimes I forget.

So in a week’s time, when I’m lost under the 6 page to-do list and all the un-filed filing, someone remind me please.