Evening Prayer Monday, 26 October 2020

Go peaceful
in gentleness
through the violence of these days.
Give freely.
Show tenderness
in all your ways.
Through darkness,
in troubled times
let holiness be your aim.

Seek wisdom.
Let faithfulness
burn like a flame.
God speed you!
God lead you,
and keep you wrapped around His heart!
May you be known by love.
Be righteous.

Speak truthfully
in a world of greed and lies.
Show kindness.
See everyone
through heaven’s eyes.
God hold you,
enfold you,
and keep you wrapped around His heart.
May you be known by love.

Paul Field
© Meadowgreen Music / EMI Christian Music Publishing.

Good evening and welcome to Evening Prayer

The Lord almighty grant us a quiet night and a perfect end.
Amen. 

Our help is in the name of the Lord
who made heaven and earth

That this evening may be holy, good and peaceful,
let us pray with one heart and mind.

Silence is kept. 

As our evening prayer rises before you, O God,
so may your mercy come down upon us
to cleanse our hearts
and set us free to sing your praise
now and for ever.
Amen. 

Presence

I pause for a moment, aware that God is here.
I think of how everything around me,
the air I breathe, my whole body,
is tingling with the the presence of God.

Freedom

I will ask God’s help,
to be free from my own preoccupations,
to be open to God in this time of prayer,
to come to know, love and serve God more.

Consciousness

There is a time and place for everything, as the saying goes.
Lord, grant that I may always desire
to spend time in your presence.
To hear your call.

THE WORD OF GOD 

1 Thessalonians 1:4–10   

For we know, brothers and sisters beloved by God,
that he has chosen you, because our message of the gospel
came to you not in word only, but also in power and in the
Holy Spirit and with full conviction; just as you know what
kind of people we proved to be among you for your sake.
And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for in spite
of persecution you received the word with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit,
so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia.
For the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia,
but in every place where your faith in God has become known,
so that we have no need to speak about it.
For the people of those regions report about us what kind
of welcome we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols,
to serve a living and true God,  and to wait for his Son from heaven,
whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues
us from the wrath that is coming.

WORDS OF WISDOM 

Nowhere is my destination.
And no one is my identity.

My daily bread is powerlessness.
Temptations can be overwhelming.
Gone is every hope of help.

An abyss opens up within me.
I am falling, falling,
Plunging into non-existence.

Is this annihilation?
Or, is it the path to the Silent Love
That we are?. . .

Thomas Keating, “The Last Laugh”

In both its poetic and spiritual subtlety, this poem, excerpted above, marks a later stage in Thomas Keating’s journey. Though he clearly attained to “unity consciousness” by the final decade of his life, I believe this poem is a living confirmation that, in the words of Christian contemplative mystic Bernadette Roberts (1931–2017), the unitive stage of the journey is itself a passage.

Contrary to what most of the saints and mystics seem to imply, the stage of “union with God” is not a permanent state or a spiritual rank acquired. It has a beginning and an end. In “The Last Laugh” we are witnessing the end of a journey, as the final veil of separate selfhood—“self” consciousness itself—is drawn back to reveal at last the riddle of the true self.

As the poem opens, Thomas is clearly in liminal space, midway between tedium and transfiguration. Dark night and unitive dawn are no longer all that different; reality simply is as it is. All emotional drama has dropped out, since there is no longer a fixed point of selfhood to be “happy” or “unhappy” about a situation. “Nowhere is my destination and no one is my identity,” he remarks simply, and while this may sound awful to our egoic minds, still fixed on defining ourselves by “who we are” or what lies ahead, there is also a solemn freedom here: no longer any buttons to be pushed, no dog in the fight. Time no longer rushes on into the future, but rests comfortably in a more spacious now.

Final union or ultimate annihilation, he wonders. What if they turn out to be the same? The line is pretty startling. “Annihilation” is a very strong word in the Christian spiritual vocabulary. You don’t find it used often, even in classic descriptions of the Dark Night of the Spirit. It is more frequently mentioned within the Sufi tradition, where fana—total annihilation—means something way beyond simply the death of the ego self. It is more like the extinguishing of our most primordial sense of selfhood or “I-ness.” Toward that abyss Thomas finds himself now rapidly plunging.

And then, out of nowhere, the turn . . .

It all begins with that tiny word “or.” Linger over it. It is as sacred and subtle as that moment when outbreath turns back into inbreath and the cycle miraculously begins again.

Or, is it the path to the Silent Love / That we are?

And you realize that the final veil of selfhood is actually a bridal veil, but now you are standing in the nuptial chamber. With a joyful laugh, you let it go.

Cynthia Bourgeault 

https://cac.org/a-silent-love-2020-10-26/
Copyright © 2018 by CAC. Used by permission of CAC. All rights reserved worldwide

PRAYERS AND INTERCESSIONS 

We pray for the world… 

Lord, in your mercy
hear our prayer. 

We pray for the universal church of Christ… 

Lord, in your mercy
hear our prayer. 

We pray for one another and all those known to us… 

Lord, in your mercy
hear our prayer. 

THE LORD’S PRAYER

As our Saviour taught us, so we pray

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.

Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours
now and for ever.
Amen. 

Silence…. 

Visit this place, O Lord, we pray,
and drive far from it the snares of the enemy;
may your holy angels dwell with us and guard us in peace,
and may your blessing be always upon us;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen. 

See that you are at peace among yourselves, my children,
and love one another.
Follow the example of the wise and good
and God will comfort you and help you,
both in this world
and in the world which is to come.

+ In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

THE BLESSINGS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnC7z03QkEM

Revd. Ernesto Lozada-Uzuriaga