Re: Peace poem

[Guest guest]

Lovely prayer./exhortation, poem.

Does everyone realize that prayer is a " sacrifice " ? It is not just words we

say about some terrible event, lay it at G-d's feet and leaving then for

our normal lives.

Prayer forces a personal commitment on us to the person prayed for.

Individually, we should think hard to see how seriously we intend to follow

through, We burden our own soul and we really must be careful how much we

take on and whether or not this is a true vocation.

I say this because I see the great upsurge in prayer at this time.( maybe it

is just our anxiety speaking out loud.) The Japanese culture has a strange

rule: If someone falls and you pick him up, or if you help someone, you are

taking responsibility for that person. I have seen many Japanese walk around

a figure of one fallen to avoid this responsibility.

Real prayer, it seems to me, is more than uttering the words and even more

than a moment's concentration. What " ?? we are telling the All something it

doesn't know? --We are exhorting the Imago Dei to pay better attention?---

We are looking for miracles? We want to ausage some guilt? Or we are engaged

in ritual and automatically pray for 'others "

The person we get to know,in real prayer, maybe more than we wish to, is

ourselves.And that is sometimes very difficult.

As Fox writes:

" The personal process of taking life seriously is the process of becoming

radicalized;that is rooted into life, allowing life itself to reach us as an

experience, the ultimate Mystery and posssibility.; Allowing life itself to

reach us, I repeat. " ( radical is here used in Fox's way as " rooted in

life " " ) That is how one person sees prayer, but i could quote many

more,persons of experience with prayer.

Where there is passion in life there is risk, the willingness to lose it " He

also reminds us.

I personally believe we indulge in public prayer as a cultural not religious

activity. No one , or few are seriously considering the price of

intercession.( I hear of prayer lists, an ambitious undertaking, often done

without reflection on its practitioners.)Or those personal petitions at Mass

or services.

" Prophetic prayer, as Fox, sees it " ,will grasp a person in the depths where

his vocation lies....a prayer is a way of confronting life's enemies. An

attitude toward evil doers, it is man's struggle with evil " ... " and for

justice " Prayer used to be prophecy...speaking out " G-d's word. Now we have

stopped putting our lives on the line when we speak out G-d's word as of

old,and as a general rule ,and substitute harmless verbal exhortation.

Struggling against evil and for justice is what prayer is really all about.

Our involment in life.

Praying is self sacrifice and an announcement we are willing to suffer to

bring about a result. But since prayer is a verbal expression of love, that

is obvious.

Unfortunately, in this time of war we are publicly exhorted to prayer,. to

me an act of cultural anxiety and a show of piety, but

not in general, prayer.We bow our heads together and ask for what we think

is the right outcome, say Amen and leave feeling so much better. That to me

is an excersize in futility, or at best a way to seeing oneself if one is

really praying.

How on earth can we pray for peace? No One is gioing to impose it on us from

above. We cannot even consider praying for it until we ourselves are at

peace. How presumptuous it would be, if while we pray for peace we are

personally " at war' with ourselves, our family menbers or our neighbor whose

dog just pooped all over our new lawn Or if we hate Saddam Hussein, or the

French for example, themselves. i am not speaking of condoning their actions

in the case of Iran.( hate the sin but love the sinner) The French are

another matter. Is our distrust, dislike and fury not based on envy as it

has been historically , for French culture and its influence on us? In any

case harboring unpleasant thoughts cannot be part of a person who is praying

for peace.

" Let peace begin with me " is my sort of prayer, because I must be peaceful

to pray for a larger peace. Or that is the way i believe it works.

Again this is personal experience, questioning, probing and understanding. I

am not proclaiming Absolute truth, just my interpretation of my life and

thoughts...and my reading of the spirit in Scripture..( also i must add my

reaction to all the TV piety and that from our " Born again " administration)

Prayer is not a passtime, or a feel good session. it is in my opinion very

serious as it will change us and our lives.

Toni

To: <JUNG-FIRE >

Sent: Sunday, April 06, 2003 8:51 AM

Subject: Peace poem

PRAY FOR PEACE

by Ellen Bass

Pray to whomever you kneel down to:

Jesus nailed to his wooden or marble or plastic cross,

his suffering face bent to kiss you,

Buddha still under the Bo tree in scorching heat,

Adonai, Allah, raise your arms to

that she may lay her palm on our brows,

to Shekinhah, Queen of Heaven and Earth,

to Inanna in her stripped descent.

Hawk or Wolf, or the Great Whale, Record Keeper

of time before, time now, time ahead, pray. Bow down

to terriers and shepherds and siamese cats.

Fields of artichokes and elegant strawberries.

Pray to the bus driver who takes you to work,

pray on the bus, pray for everyone riding that bus

and for everyone riding buses all over the world.

If you haven't been on a bus in a long time,

climb the few steps, drop some silver, and pray.

Waiting in line for the movies, for the ATM,

for your latte and croissant, offer your plea.

Make your eating and drinking a supplication.

Make your slicing of carrots a holy act,

each translucent layer of the onion, a deeper prayer.

Make the brushing of your hair

a prayer, every strand its own voice,

singing in the choir on your head.

As you wash your face, the water slipping

through your fingers, a prayer: Water,

softest thing on earth, gentleness

that wears away rock.

Making love, of course, is already a prayer.

Skin and open mouths worshipping that skin,

the fragile case we are poured into,

each caress a season of peace.

If you're hungry, pray. If you're tired.

Pray to Gandhi and Dorothy Day.

Shakespeare. Sappho. Sojourner Truth.

Pray to the angels and the ghost of your grandfather.

When you walk to your car, to the mailbox,

to the video store, let each step

be a prayer that we all keep our legs,

that we do not blow off anyone else's legs.

Or crush their skulls.

And if you are riding on a bicycle

or a skateboard, in a wheel chair, each revolution

of the wheels a prayer that as the earth revolves

we will do less harm, less harm, less harm.

And as you work, typing with a new manicure,

a tiny palm tree painted on one pearlescent nail

or delivering soda or drawing good blood

into rubber-capped vials, writing on a blackboard

with yellow chalk, twirling pizzas, pray for peace.

With each breath in, take in the faith of those

who have believed when belief seemed foolish,

who persevered. With each breath out, cherish.

Pull weeds for peace, turn over in your sleep for peace,

feed the birds for peace, each shiny seed

that spills onto the earth, another second of peace.

Wash your dishes, call your mother, drink wine.

Shovel leaves or snow or trash from your sidewalk.

Make a path. Fold a photo of a dead child

around your VISA card. Gnaw your crust

of prayer, scoop your prayer water from the gutter.

Mumble along like a crazy person, stumbling

your prayer through the streets.

Alice O. Howell

Rosecroft

Box 177

Monterey, MA 01245-0177 USA

Tel:

Fax:

" Look for the sacred in the commonplace! "