Today

Nothing
in the world
is usual today.
This is
the first morning.

~~Izumi Shikbu

Wednesday Prayer

Christ is Risen: The world below lies desolate.
Christ is Risen: The spirits of evil are fallen.
Christ is Risen: The angels of God are rejoicing.
Christ is Risen: The tombs of the dead are empty.
Christ is Risen indeed from the dead, the first of the sleepers.
Glory and power are his forever and ever.

St. Hippolytus of Rome (AD 190-236)

Tuesday Prayer--A Prayer to St. Brigid of Ireland

Saint Brigid
You were a woman of peace.
You brought harmony where there was conflict.
You brought light to the darkness.
You brought hope to the downcast.
May the mantle of your peace cover those who are troubled and anxious,
and may peace be firmly rooted in our hearts and in our world.
Inspire us to act justly and to reverence all God has made.
Brigid you were a voice for the wounded and the weary.
Strengthen what is weak within us.
Calm us into a quietness that heals and listens.
May we grow each day into greater wholeness in mind, body and spirit.
Amen

--Source

Editor's note: Both of my friend's grandmothers died this past week. They were both very strong, very Irish women. This prayer is posted in their honor. I put the link of the website that I found it from, but did not see an author.

Yet Another Serenity Prayer

...this time from Eve Tushnet, in an article on the wounds of Jesus.


"Lord, please give me the willingness to be healed in the ways you wish to heal me, the courage to accept the ways you wish to glorify my wounds, and the wisdom to know the difference."

Prayer for Easter 4

Lord,
We who live in a world of cities, tall buildings, one way streets, suburbs, and gated communities don’t necessarily know what sheep are like or what sheepherding entails. Sometimes we do feel like sheep in our world being herded by the dos and don’ts, oughts and ought naughts, media, voices we don’t even recognize. Sometimes the den of the voices gets so loud we can’t even recognize our own voice. Calm and quieten our hearts, our minds and our souls to that one small voice; yours. And in hearing your voice we hear our own voices that we sing your song of grace to one another. Amen. Abi

cross posted at rev gal blog pals

Saturday Prayer, for Earth Day

God of creation, the earth is yours
with all its beauty and goodness,
its rich and overflowing provision.

But we have claimed it for our own,
plundered its beauty for profit,
grabbed its resources for ourselves.

God of creation, forgive us.
May we no longer abuse your trust,
but care gently and with justice for your earth.
-Jan Berry

Thursday Prayer

Wednesday Prayer

Logos

Why wonder about the loaves and the fishes?
If you say the right words, the wine expands.
If you say them with love
and the felt ferocity of that love
and the felt necessity of that love,
the fish explode into the many.
Imagine him, speaking,
and don't worry about what is reality,
or what is plain, or what is mysterious.
If you were there, it was all those things.
If you can imagine it, it was all those things.
Eat, drink, be happy.
Accept the miracle.
Accept, too, each spoken word
spoken with love.

~ Mary Oliver ~

(Why I Wake Early)

Tuesday Prayer--An Adaptation of the Prayer of Jesus

Eternal Spirit,
Life-Giver, Pain-Bearer, Love Maker,
Source of all that is and that shall be,
Father and Mother of us all,
Loving God, in whom is heaven:
The Hallowing of your Name echo through the universe!
The Way of your Justice be followed by the people of the world!
Your Heavenly Will be done by all created beings!
Your Commonwealth of Peace and Freedom sustain our hope and come on earth!
With the bread we need for today, feed us.
In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us.
In times of temptation and test, strengthen us.
From trials too great to endure, spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil, free us.
For your reign is the glory of the power that is love, now and forever. Amen.
--Jim Cotter "Spirit Prayer"

You Are Mine

Prayer for Easter 3

Lord, we sing your praises loud and clear for all you have done for us.
We thank you for being with us in our times of grief.
We thank you for hearing our cries in the night.
We thank you for bringing your joy to joyless lives
We thank you for seeing us through the messes in our lives.
We thank you for friends and family whom we love and who love us.
We thank you for your great mercy and faithfulness.

Lord we take time now to pray for all those who are grieving.
For those who suffer from illnesses.
For those among us who are in the hospital.
For those who are struggling financially.
For those who are in a troubled relationship.
Lord we pray for you resurrection power in their lives.

Lord we pray for those who are hurting in our world.
We pray the country of Poland who has suffered a traumatic loss of their President
and so many of their country’s leaders.
We pray for those who are suffering from Iceland’s volcano,
which has caused flight delays and other problems.
We pray for those who lost loved ones in the many recent earthquakes, especially those in China.
We pray for those who are starving in the world today.

Lord we pray for revgalblogpals who are traveling to their retreat this weekend,
keep them safe and restore and nourish them.
We pray for those revgalblogpals who were unable to go this time,
may they experience the power of your resurrection in their lives.
Amen

cross posted at revgalblogpals

Saturday Prayer: Courage

Empower me
to be a bold participant,
rather than a timid saint in waiting
in the difficult ordinariness of now;
to exercise the authority of honesty,
rather than to defer to power,
or deceive to get it;
to influence someone for justice,
rather than impress anyone for gain;
and, by grace, to find treasures
of joy, of friendship, of peace
hidden in the fields of the daily
you give me to plow.
-Ted Loder

Thursday Thought on Prayer

"Prayer is an all-efficient panoply, a treasure undiminished, a mine which is never exhausted, a sky unobscured by clouds, a heaven unruffled by the storm. It is the root, the fountain, the mother of a thousand blessings."

~~Saint John Chrysostom

Wednesday Prayer

Break the box and shed the nard;
Stop not now to count the cost;
Hither bring pearl, opal, sard;
Reck not what the poor have lost;
Upon Christ throw all away:
Know ye, this is Easter Day.

Build His church and deck His shrine;
Empty though it be on earth;
Ye have kept your choicest wine-
Let it flow for heavenly mirth;
Pluck the harp and breathe the horn:
Know ye not 'tis Easter mom?

Gather gladness from the skies;
Take a lesson from the ground;
Flowers do ope their heavenward eyes
And a Spring-time joy have found;
Earth throws Winter's robes away,
Decks herself for Easter Day.

Beauty now for ashes wear,
Perfumes for the garb of woe.
Chaplets for dishevelled hair,
Dances for sad footsteps slow;
Open wide your hearts that they
Let in joy this Easter Day.

Seek God's house in happy throng;
Crowded let His table be;
Mingle praises, prayer and song,
Singing to the Trinity.
Henceforth let your souls alway
Make each morn an Easter Day.

-- Gerald Manley Hopkins

Tuesday Prayer

Springtime Prayer

O Dancer of Creation,
the earth awakens to an urgent call to grow.
In the hidden recesses of my wintered spirit
I, too, hear the humming of your voice,
calling me, wooing my deadness back to life.

My soul yawns, stretches, quickens,
as the energy of Spring revives my weariness.
I sit with wonder, observing the steady activity
of downy woodpeckers and newly yellowed finch.
I do so wait with the avid attention of a child's first look,
savoring the colors and shapes of earth's loveliness.

As the filtering patterns of early sunlight
lift the shades of green in every growing thing,
I enter into spring's unlettered words of life.
For a while my doubts, anxieties, and worries
become like chapters in some ancient book
whose text no longer claims my full attention.
I am content to sit, watching Spring
turn the pages of this animated publication,
eager to discover the invigorating story
reflected in my own springtime revelation.

Tell me, Wise Awakener,
why is it easier to believe in a stem of new grass,
or the opening bud of a fresh purple crocus,
than it is to believe in the greening of me?

---Joyce Rupp

Taken from Prayers to Sophia. Copyright 2000 by Joyce Rupp. All Rights Reserved. Used by permission of Innisfree Press, Inc.

How a Friend Writes to a Friend

The great outflow of divine love that never ceases flows on and on unceasingly and effortlessly in such a sweet course unfailingly that our tiny vessel becomes full and brims over. If we do not block it with self-will, our small vessel is always overflowing with God's favor....

The mind of God and of the loving soul come together in the same manner as the sun and the air join together through the majestic energy of God in a sweet, vibrant mixture in which the sun overcomes the coldness and darkness of the air, so that one notices only that it is all one sun. That comes from divine bliss.

May God give us all this love and preserve it for us! Amen.

Mechthild of Magdeburg, The Flowing Light of the Godhead VII.55

Prayer for Easter 2

Lord,
We find ourselves in the locked doors of ourselves just as the disciples were behind closed doors. We too are afraid, perhaps for a different reason than theirs. But we too need the breath of the Holy Spirit to take away our fears so that we can come out from behind these locked doors.

Lord, we are like Thomas with our questions and our doubts. We sometimes need to see in order to believe, we need you in order to have faith.

Lord, we too need the peace you bring because our world is fraught with violence, and unrest.

Lord, just as Thomas confessed you are his Lord and his God, we boldly claim for our lives.

Lord we thank you for the blessing you have given us, the ones who believe without seeing.

Lord, may the doors of our churches be open to all and that doubters be welcomed here.

cross posted at revgalblogpals

Prayer of Wonder

Almighty and everlasting God, you made the universe with all its marvelous order, its atoms, worlds, and galaxies, and all the infinite complexity of living creatures: Grant that, as we prove the mysteries of your creation, we may come to know you more truly, and more surely fulfill our role in your eternal purpose; in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
-BCP p. 827

Cross-posted to The Kitchen Door.

Rose as metaphor

Transport

The rose, for all its behavior,
is smaller than the lifelove it stands for,
only briefly brightening,
and even its odor
only a metaphor.
Or so we suppose
just as we suppose the savior
we employ or see next door
is only some hired man
gardening.

by Marie Ponsot

Tuesday Prayer

Great God of all, who has created us all alike in your image and called us equally to your service: we ask that all who seek to serve you in the ministry of your church may be free to do so to the fullest extent of their calling.

We pray for those who struggle to bring light and freedom into your church by prising open closed doors and shuttered minds, dismantling barriers and overturning old prejudices. Give them strength to continue their work with courage, tenacity and an unquenchable sense of purpose and justice.

We pray for those who have been wounded on the way, asking you to restore their hope and dignity and continue to lead them in your service.

Especially we pray for those who restrict the freedom of others through their own ignorance, fear, greed or arrogant certainty. Soften their hearts and widen their understanding, so that they may see that allowing others to play a full part in building your kingdom does not threaten or diminish their own contribution.

Hear our prayers, O God, which we make with all the men and women who have witnessed and worked for you through the ages, and in whose glorious tradition we stand, through your son, our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen

Revd Dr. Margaret Joachim

(Edited for context and inclusiveness by Cody E. Maynus)

This Joyful Eastertide

Easter Sunday Morning Prayer

On this Easter morn we welcome you Jesus into our lives.
We welcome your resurrection for it is
life changing, life giving and life sustaining.
We welcome the hope it brings to our world.
We welcome the joy it brings to our darkness.
We welcome the empty tomb for we know that it means you are on the loose.

Lord, may your resurrection give life to those who feel lifeless,
those who are just going through the motions,
and those who have had the death of a loved one.

Lord, may your resurrection give hope to those who are mired in despair,
who feel hopeless,
and who have given up all hope.

Lord, may your resurrection give joy to those who feel no joy,
lost their joy or have had their joy snuffed out.

Lord, may you be on the loose in this world as the risen one..
cross posted at revgalblog pals and rev abi's long and winding road

painting of the Risen Christ by HeQui

Holy Saturday Prayers

As we wait for Easter, for our observance of the resurrection, and as we wait for resurrections in our own lives:

In times of despair, O God, rain showers of gentleness upon us, that we may be kindly to one another and also to ourselves. Renew in us the spirit of hope. Even in the depths of the darkness, may we hear the approach of the One who harrows hell and greets even Judas with a kiss.
-Jim Cotter

Cross-posted to The Kitchen Door.

Good Friday Prayer

Merciful God, creator of all the peoples of the earth and lover of souls: Have compassion on all who do not know you as you are revealed in your Son Jesus Christ; let your Gospel be preached with grace and power to those who have not heard it; turn the hearts of those who resist it; and bring home to your fold those who have gone astray; that there may be one flock under one shepherd, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Maunday Thursday Prayer

Holy God, source of all love, on the night of
his betrayal, Jesus gave his disciples a new
commandment:To love one another as he had loved
them.  We pray you,by your Holy Spirit write
this commandment in our hearts.  Help us serve
as Jesus served, to not be afraid to offer
ourselves for the sake of others.
Amen