Monday, February 18, 2013
Becket, W. sr (2007) Sister Wendy on Prayer. Continuum
God wants you to be the fullness of what you could be. You cannot become this if you do not allow Him to enter into you. You do your feeble search for Him, and He will do His mighty search for you. 'seek and ye shall find' The 'you' God seeks may not be the 'you' of whom you are aware. it is the essential you, the real you, the fullness of your potential. The transformation from one to the other, the realising of that potential you, may take a lifetime. Few of us will ever wholly achieve this complete surrender. But all God needs is your desire. 22
Prayer is essential an attitude. We trust God, we believe in Him, we turn to Him. An attitude is something permanent. So how could prayer stop when we , as it were , stop praying? It would be as if your relationship with your parents only existed when you were in actual contact with them 29
Having God as our Father does not relegate us to the position of perpetual children. Children do expect that their parents will 'put things right', and it can be a shattering experience to realize that parents are weak and human. But, from the shards, we build up a more adult personality. bad things happen, sometimes for no apparent reason. we have to accept them and grow through them and never let them damage us. They will wound us, yes, but damage is another matter, and that is precisely what prayer guards against. 41
What prayer does is alert us to its presence so that we are always making the best of things and not the worst. Tragedy and frustration remain their painful selves, but prayer in accepting them changes the pain into something redemptive. 43
To be mere automatons for whom God arranges the world to cause us us no suffering would mean we never have a self. We could not make choices... We can never become fuly human if we are protected from life. We have to learn and understand our vulnerability 45
GOd - this is essentially a meaningless word. no thoughts can encompass God. There is no box into which you can put Him. He, or for that matter she, completely transcends any human concepts. When we say 'god' we are doing no more than pointing a finger. It is a directional word. Forced to give a definition, all I could say is that god is Reality so absolute that all other realities are relative 64
Sometimes I blush for those who think themselves Christian and yet the God they worship is cruel, suspicious, punitive and watchful. who could love such a God? If that is your idea of God, you are obliged by all the rules of morality and common sense to become an atheist. 73
Humility is nothing to do with having a low opinion of our qualities; it is all to do with not being interested in them, not gazing long and devoted at yourself 91
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One of the effects of prayer is that it exposes us to ourselves. If we pray, that comfortable cloak that assures us of our virtue begins to fray, to dissipate, to uncover the sorry nakedness of what we really are. 98
Simple faith - what they are referring to is an almost rote reception of mass and sacraments based on pitifully slight know ledge... What they are really describing is ignorant faith, last faith, a refusal to engage the revelation of God with the full dimensions of what we are or what we can be. 118
We must bring our minds to our faith, not just our hearts. Faith does not mean ticking off our assent to dogma, although that may pass for faith. True faith, the virtue of faith, entails a profound involvement with the truth of jesus. We have to understand it. Unless we know what 'the Gospel' really is and the fullness of what Jesus had to tell us, our faith can be a surface thing 119
Hope accepts all disaster, understands it as disaster, but knows that fundamentally it is irrelevant. It is so convinced of the goodness of God, of His compassionate love, that it will always remain steadfast... Body and soul may feel we ar wasting our time. Hope smiles and ignores them 123
We who cling to Jesus believe in possession by God, the Holy Spirit. However poor and humble our prayer, this is it's aim: that God will take possession of us, live within us, give His love to the world through us. 132
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Prayer is essential an attitude. We trust God, we believe in Him, we turn to Him. An attitude is something permanent. So how could prayer stop when we , as it were , stop praying? It would be as if your relationship with your parents only existed when you were in actual contact with them 29
Having God as our Father does not relegate us to the position of perpetual children. Children do expect that their parents will 'put things right', and it can be a shattering experience to realize that parents are weak and human. But, from the shards, we build up a more adult personality. bad things happen, sometimes for no apparent reason. we have to accept them and grow through them and never let them damage us. They will wound us, yes, but damage is another matter, and that is precisely what prayer guards against. 41
What prayer does is alert us to its presence so that we are always making the best of things and not the worst. Tragedy and frustration remain their painful selves, but prayer in accepting them changes the pain into something redemptive. 43
To be mere automatons for whom God arranges the world to cause us us no suffering would mean we never have a self. We could not make choices... We can never become fuly human if we are protected from life. We have to learn and understand our vulnerability 45
GOd - this is essentially a meaningless word. no thoughts can encompass God. There is no box into which you can put Him. He, or for that matter she, completely transcends any human concepts. When we say 'god' we are doing no more than pointing a finger. It is a directional word. Forced to give a definition, all I could say is that god is Reality so absolute that all other realities are relative 64
Sometimes I blush for those who think themselves Christian and yet the God they worship is cruel, suspicious, punitive and watchful. who could love such a God? If that is your idea of God, you are obliged by all the rules of morality and common sense to become an atheist. 73
Humility is nothing to do with having a low opinion of our qualities; it is all to do with not being interested in them, not gazing long and devoted at yourself 91
01159448777
One of the effects of prayer is that it exposes us to ourselves. If we pray, that comfortable cloak that assures us of our virtue begins to fray, to dissipate, to uncover the sorry nakedness of what we really are. 98
Simple faith - what they are referring to is an almost rote reception of mass and sacraments based on pitifully slight know ledge... What they are really describing is ignorant faith, last faith, a refusal to engage the revelation of God with the full dimensions of what we are or what we can be. 118
We must bring our minds to our faith, not just our hearts. Faith does not mean ticking off our assent to dogma, although that may pass for faith. True faith, the virtue of faith, entails a profound involvement with the truth of jesus. We have to understand it. Unless we know what 'the Gospel' really is and the fullness of what Jesus had to tell us, our faith can be a surface thing 119
Hope accepts all disaster, understands it as disaster, but knows that fundamentally it is irrelevant. It is so convinced of the goodness of God, of His compassionate love, that it will always remain steadfast... Body and soul may feel we ar wasting our time. Hope smiles and ignores them 123
We who cling to Jesus believe in possession by God, the Holy Spirit. However poor and humble our prayer, this is it's aim: that God will take possession of us, live within us, give His love to the world through us. 132
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