Tag: Father

Making Habits Holy

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Ritual is routine infused with mindfulness. It is habit made holy.

The quote above is in a book by Kent Nerburn entitled Small Graces: The Quiet Gifts of Everyday Life. Ritual becomes routine, or even a rut, when it is thoughtlessly done. The habits we develop in life can become holy if we pay close attention to what we are doing.

I have mentioned here before about some of my daily habits like prayer and journaling. However, Nerburn is not writing about things like this that seem important or vital. No, he is picturing small graces or quiet gifts.

He illustrates what he means with a morning ritual.

I take my morning mug of coffee in both hands and lift it ever so slightly toward the sky. I am alone. There is no one to see. This is my private gesture–my acknowledgement, my offering, my moment of thankfulness for the gift of this awakening day. . . . My morning cup of coffee . . . partaken with mindfulness . . . is a small act of worship, an act of consecration, a prayer of thankfulness to the awakening day.

I also have a morning habit. When I first get out of bed, I go the the sink in our restroom. I turn on the facet, running water into my hands, and I rinse my face three times, practicing an ancient Celtic Christian ritual. With the first, I say silently, “in the name of the Father.” With the second, “and the Son”. With the third, “and the Holy Spirit, I welcome this day.” Now here is the key to making a routine into a ritual or a habit into something holy. I must think about what I am saying. And I must mean what I say. I confess that some mornings, I just got through the motions and what I do had no spiritual blessing about it at all. But when I am mindful in doing it, the morning begins with a touch of holiness.

If you have some little ritual that you do most days, I would love to hear about it in a comment. If you don’t have any, perhaps you will be able to discover one that can be a daily blessing–if done mindfully.

paying attention

ritual is like rich soil

nurturing flowers

As always you are welcome to share this blog with others. If you want to receive my blogs in your email, simply toggle the follow button. May your day be filled with mindfulness and peace. LaMon

Imagining God

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One pathway to God is through prayer, but not all prayers bring us into God’s presence. One day the disciples of Jesus asked him to teach them how to pray. The story and subsequent teaching is found in Luke 11:1-4. Here we find the earliest version of what is traditionally called the Lord’s Prayer. It is not the version most people know. The more liturgically full version is found in Matthew’s gospel. However, for the next several blogs I am going to look at what is surely the original version in order to think about how, in adapting and using this prayer, we can find ourselves in the presence of God.

It begins with one word–Father. (There is no “our”, nor “who is in heaven”). This prayer does have a corporate side as later blogs will show, but it begins one on one–the one praying and and the One listening. And the One listening is not far away, but is as near as a the air we breathe.

For those who balk at the use of the word “Father” as patriarchal, I would quickly add that in English I sometimes use Mother, for as Julian of Norwich correctly affirmed, “As truly as God is our Father, so truly is God our Mother.”

But let’s stick with what Jesus said and try to imagine what he meant. In Jesus’ native language, Aramaic, there are two words for the male parent; abhi and abba. The first word is the ‘higher’ word. It is a word of respect and honor. The second word is one of the first words an Aramaic baby would learn to say (along with imma). It is the child’s word. It is also the word adult children would use for the male parent when there was a close feeling of love and trust between child and parent. It was the word of intimacy. Perhaps our English words daddy and papa correspond best to the meaning. This Aramaic word is found three times in the Greek New Testament, indicative that it was the normal word Jesus used in his prayer language and the word he taught his disciples to use. (A side note: as far as we know Jesus was the first person to use this familiar language for God.)

Jesus taught his disciples to imagine that God is exactly like what Jesus had experienced God to be. God is entirely trustworthy. God is infinitely loving. God is eternally open to an intimate relationship with seekers.

So, when you pray, no matter how you might address God, imagine God to be like that. Perhaps it will help you to find a path into God’s presence.