O Lord, open our lips;
and our mouth shall proclaim your praise.Visit us with your salvation
and sustain us with your gracious spirit.
That shift in consciousness from “me me me” – selfish, self-obsessed, held tight, defensive – to “I and You” – relaxed, open, other-concerned. I am ok. I am safe. There’s nothing to defend.
Dear God,
let me be so centred in You
that I am freed from all anxious self-concern.
Amen.
Religious life is a real commitment to an unknown path, giving myself in trust to You for a particular life eschewing all other lives. I give myself to You, to something unknown and uncertain, just following the feeling of consolation, but having no idea where it is leading, and with no objective evidence that this is a life well lived.