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Orthodoxy/Orthopraxy/Fire

4/30/2013

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"Orthodoxy is about being consumed by glory: the word means not 'right belief' (as dictionaries tell us) but right doxa, right glory. To be orthodox is to be set alight by the fire of God."

--Kenneth Leech

I'll confess right up front that I am fed up with what I have perceived to be a preoccupation with right belief in the Christian milieu in which I was formed. I prefer the emphasis on orthopraxy (right action) which is making headway in the Christian imagination, but it also makes me a little nervous. I can't help but imagine that eventually  political correctness will infect our perception of right action. 

Father Leech's way of understanding orthodoxy sets the bar a lot higher, probably beyond our reach. I can't imagine way to achieve right glory. And to be set alight by the fire of God looks to me like a supernatural gift. 

After much reflection on the human condition, that is, my own shortcomings, the only position that I've come to trust is that of the humble receiver of gifts. Furthermore, the only condition of heart and mind that can believe and act rightly is the state I'll describe as awe and wonder. Only a heart in right relationship to God, awestruckdumb, if you will, has a
chance of rising to this level of orthodoxy. And only a heart that longs for this gift has a chance of receiving it. And we won't do that if we keep hanging on to the dualistic ideas inherent in the common understanding of orthodoxy and
orthopraxy.
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What is Intercession?

4/23/2013

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"Intercessory prayer is not a technique for changing God's mind, but it is a releasing of God's power through placing
ourselves in a relationship of co-operation with God. It is an act. Prayer and action should not be opposed to each other, for prayer is action. Intercession means literally to stand between, to become involved in the conflict."

--Kenneth Leech

While I am a proponent of divine mystery, meaning that I believe that we are better served by contemplating the mysteries of the faith than by settling for easily understood explanations, I find myself wanting to make sense of the practice of intercessory prayer. It's not easy. The obvious, familiar difficulty is that God knows best what is needed and loves the people or persons for whom we are praying far more than we do. 
 
I can imagine that God would want to share with us the joy of loving his creation and that intercessory prayer is an act of love. But there are far more compelling and courageous ways to love and to pray. Even the act of deep attention given to another person or any part of creation appears more loving to me then asking God to change something. Additionally, I can think of dozens of hard circumstances that produced fruit that would not have ripened if God had answered my prayer for reprieve. I feel more drawn to
the prayer, "Thy will, not mine be done?"

It is my hope that when we are encouraged to petition God, it means something very different than what I have seen modeled. The above quote speaks to something deep in me, especially the picture of co-operating with God. And to think about intercession as becoming involved in the conflict is also an attractive invitation. I sense that there is much in
what Father Leech is saying that I don't yet understand, but I intend to continue mulling it over. I simply recommend it to you for your own reflection. Does anything in this quote stir your understanding of intercessory prayer?
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Pray Without Ceasing

4/15/2013

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"Pray without ceasing"
1 Thessalonians 5:17

I've come to experience unceasing prayer as facing
reality–my external circumstances and my internal responses–while intentionally opening to God's presence. Rather than an ongoing conversation its more like a
shared awareness.

When I face into life and notice my internal reactions
to that life and allow it all to come into consciousness with as few filters or judgments as possible, I've found that God is neither judging nor resisting what's happening. Instead I experience God smiling knowingly as I become increasingly aware of both the great gift, that is, my life in Christ, and, my
egocentric response to that same gift. (Sometimes I don't have the eyes to see the great gift as gift.)

When I am feeling the unnamed angst that would
drive me into unconscious, automatic coping behaviors, I can, because of my awareness of God's presence, simply allow it to be a part of my reality. When I let God join me in the experience rather than attempting to bear it alone, I'm
not as inclined to compulsive, myopic introspection. Nor am I as likely to jump to the same old conclusions (I need to try harder, I'm useless); rather, by letting God's light and healing presence work beyond consciousness, and letting
the shame-based desire to fix myself be overcome by God's unconditional love, I can allow the Spirit to do what can only be done by God's Spirit in the context of my actual life.  

Yes, it is hard to release control and trust God rather than my own resources. Like everyone, I feel obliged to take responsibility for myself. But with theblessing of five decades it has been made very clear that I am not that good at managing my own transformation.

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From My Grandfather's Blessing

4/9/2013

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But I know that if I listen attentively to someone, to their essential self, their soul, as it were, I often find that at  the deepest, most unconscious level, they can sense the direction of their own healing and wholeness. If I can remain open to that, without expectations of what the someone is supposed to “do,” how they are supposed to change in order to be “better,” or even what their wholeness looks like, what can happen is magical. By that I mean that it has a certain coherency or integrity about it, far beyond what any way of fixing their situation or easing their pain I might devise on my own.

So I no longer have many theories about people. I
donʼt  diagnose them or decide what their problem is. I simply meet with them and  listen. As we sit together, I donʼt even have an agenda, but I know that something will emerge from our conversation over time that is a part of a larger coherent pattern that neither of us can fully see at this moment. So I
sit with  them and wait.

--Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D.

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    David Norling

    I am the awestruckdumbpilgrim

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