January Meditation

Psalm 13

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?How long must I bear pain in my soul, and have sorrow in my heart all day long? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?Consider and answer me, O Lord my God! Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep the sleep of death,and my enemy will say, “I have prevailed”; my foes will rejoice because I am shaken.But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.

Meditation: From Salt and Light by Eberhard Arnold

Never burden yourself by looking far ahead. Always live one day at a time. If you can do this, you will live like children, birds, and flowers. For them each day is a lifetime. Every day unfolds new joy, new hope, even if every day may have brought you new shadows and new nightfall. Every day you may have broken down in guilt and failure. Every day may have shown you your helplessness a thousandfold. Yet each new day brings new sun, new air, and new grace.

In this way, trust grows, trust in God and in those in whom God is at work. Jesus encourages those who obey him to pray and believe again and again. He promises that when we ask, it shall be given. To those who knock, it will be opened, and they will enter, like going through an open gate into a large garden – God’s garden. The gate is narrow, but it is there for all.

Luke says clearly what the object of this asking, believing, waiting, and daring is. It is the Spirit! If you who are evil can give your children good things, truly you can rely on God to give you what you need – the Holy Spirit. Everything contained in the Sermon on the Mount is done by this Spirit, which has the nature of a lamb. In the Spirit, the material form of God’s new creation arises; it transforms wolves into lambs, and man’s predatory world into God’s kingdom of peace.

Song: As I Go Down to the River to Pray by Alison Krauss

Sacred Silence 

Scripture (Matthew 7:7-10)

Ask and it will be given to you; search and you will find; knock and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

Next Meeting: January 26, 2017

Happy New Year to all! Our prayers are already with you, that you may continue to walk towards healing and hope in 2017. Our January meeting will be held this Thursday, the 26th, at 6:30pm in the Fireplace Room of the Saint Agnes Parish Center. Please join us for an evening of warm fellowship in the midst of this winter cold! We look forward to seeing you there.

Article: A Stoic's Guide to Becoming Mentally Strong

Readers, take or leave this one as you will! I am posting it here because I've found it useful for myself the past few weeks in trying to overcome some longstanding patterns of bad behavior in response to minor stresses. The author demonstrates Cognitive Behavioral Therapy's (CBT's) link to Stoic philosophy, and gives four "tips" based on Stoicism to help us weather the crises that face us every day.

My favorite tip, and the one I've been using daily, is to begin each day by telling myself to expect the worst - my kids will make a horrific mess, there will be aggressive drivers on the road, other people will treat me discourteously - and plotting out in advance how I'll respond - I'll calmly clean up, I'll patiently distance myself from the bad drivers, I'll respond to others with good humor. I've found that it's made me more equanimous when dealing with difficulty, and made me paradoxically really delighted and happy when my (negative) expectations aren't met!

I hope you find something helpful, insightful, or perhaps even just humorous, in this piece as well!

Article: Praying with Depression (and Children)

When her husband urges her to pray the Our Father with her daughters every day, Gillian Marchenko is stopped in her tracks by her depression: 

I think about hallowed. Hallowed be your name. In my depression, my focus is me. When in the pit, I am thinking about how to get out, not that God is in control. I’m not praying for help, even though I act like I do sometimes. I’m not sure I even want to align myself with what God wants to do in me and in the world, because I’m afraid it will mean more pain.

Read more of her reflections on depression, prayer, and what it means to say, Thy will be done when you are suffering here.