There were stories this week in the Independent and the Guardian about 130 imams and Muslim religious leaders who have refused to perform funeral prayers for the London Bridge and Borough Market attackers – "a ritual normally performed for every Muslim regardless of their actions". I understand the impulse of this and the political expediency, … Continue reading Mercy
Category: God
The Discontents of Empire (III)
Caught up in a mass of abstractions, our attention hypnotised by a host of human-made technologies that only reflect us back to ourselves, it is all too easy for us to forget our carnal inherence in a more-than-human matrix of sensations and sensibilities. Our bodies have formed themselves in delicate reciprocity with the manifold textures, … Continue reading The Discontents of Empire (III)
The Discontents of Empire (I)
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and why do you labour for that which does not satisfy? Isaiah 55.2 In the recent months I have found myself working more, and praying and writing less. I have wondered at the reasons. Several occur to me: I'm anxious about money; I … Continue reading The Discontents of Empire (I)
What’s eating away at you?
I think that … that you work on the thing that's eating away at you. And I think that the performers that we feel are wrestling with something significant are the performers that hold … they hold our attention. Why couldn't people take their eyes of Brando? Something was always eating at him. I don't … Continue reading What’s eating away at you?
Only
Real conversion is centred on God: it results from a deeper turning towards Him rather than a closer inspection of ourselves. … Conversion, at its root, is not the action performed but the source of that action, the experience of being loved.Dyckman & Carroll, Inviting the Mystic, Supporting the Prophet, 9 I am faced with … Continue reading Only
Sermon to self
Prayer is subversive activity. It involves a more or less open act of defiance against any claim by the current regime… [As we pray,] slowly but surely, not culture, not family, not government, not job, not even the tyrannous self can stand against the quiet power and creative influence of God's sovereignty. Every natural tie … Continue reading Sermon to self
How to experience God
Some people are fortunate enough to be overtaken by an experience they call God that is so clear and self-authenticating that no amount of argument to the contrary can really undermine that experience. Having once had the felt experience of God, they have both a yardstick and a lodestone for their slow, stumbling realisation that … Continue reading How to experience God
Self-improvement; not.
I am sitting in my bedroom where I have a little prayer corner. It is early on Sunday morning. The children are still asleep. Although it is cold outside, I have the window cracked open. I am swaddled in a dressing gown. I am listening to the sounds: a wood pigeon's coo, a crow's caw, … Continue reading Self-improvement; not.
Service
This week a body came for spiritual direction. She was reflecting upon busyness, upon the balance she was seeking in a life of service to God, with space for prayer and contemplation. Amongst other things, she draws and paints. She related an experience she'd had that morning. She had felt anxious about the amount of … Continue reading Service
Living with life’s ups and downs
When one enjoys consolation, let [her] consider how [she] will conduct [herself] during the time of ensuing desolation, and store up a supply of strength as defence against that day.He who enjoys consolation should take care to humble himself and lower himself as much as possible. Let him recall how little he is able to … Continue reading Living with life’s ups and downs