Little Mosque on the Prairie III

Well this week's episode was kind of fun but again things were said about the Anglican church that were just unbelievable. No, I'm not talking about the same sex wedding. It is hard to imagine that a priest who was so worried only a week ago about being shut down by the Archdeacon for financial reasons wouldn't worry about being shut down by the same Archdeacon for disobeying Church discipline (the issue is being debated in the Anglican Church of Canada but a retired Archbishop was disciplined for participating in a wedding when he didn't actually do the wedding - it is hard to imagine that the same wouldn't happen in small town Saskatchewan). But it is possible - probably as possible as the story line about Yasir taking a second wife. No, the objection I have is to naming the Anglican church Mercy Anglican. Anglican churches are not named for the town they are in. United Churches often are. But Anglican churches have some interesting saint's name. So I'd like to suggest that the church could be named St. Joseph the Carpenter, since Yasir the contractor has found a home there. Or it could be called St. Clare Anglican Church or St. Gabriel's for the patron saints of television. Or maybe St. Genesius Anglican, or St. Vitus Anglican after one of the patron saints of actors. Now that would be believable.

Lent - Day 7

Take Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, understanding, my entire will and
all that I possess.
Thou hast given all to me.
To Thee, O Lord, I return it.
All is Thine; dispose of it wholly
according to Thy will.
Give me Thy love and Thy grace,
for this is sufficient for me.

Prayer of St. Ignatius

Lent - Day 6

We should give up the foolish task of trying to be saints and get on with the more important task of trying to be human.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Lent - Day 5

Catch Me in My Scurrying

Catch me in my anxious scurrying, Lord,
and hold me in this Lenten season:
hold my feet to the fire of your grace
and make me attentive to my mortality
that I may begin to die now
to those things that keep me
from living with you
and with my neighbors on this earth;
to grudges and indifference,
to certainties that smother possibilities,
to my fascination with false securities,
to my addiction to sweatless dreams,
to my arrogant insistence on how it has to be;
to my corrosive fear of dying someday
which eats away the wonder of living this day,
and the adventure of losing my life
in order to find it in you.

Catche me in my aimless scurrying, Lord,
and hold me in this Lenten season:
hold my heart in the beat of your grace
and create in me a resting place,
a kneeling place,
a tip-toe place
where I can recover from the dis-ease of my grandiosities
which fill my mind and calendar with busy self-importance,
that I may become vulnerable enough
to dare intimacy with the familiar,
to listen cup-eared for your summons,
and to watch squint-eyes for your crooked finger
in the crying of a child,
in the hunger of the street people,
in the fear of nuclear holocaust in all people,
in the rage of those oppressed because of sex or race,
in the smoldering resentments of exploited third world nations,
in the sullen apapthy of the poor and ghetto-strangled people,
in my lonely doubt and limping ambivalence;

and somehow,
during this season of sacrifice,
enable me to sacrifice time
and posessessions
and securities,
to do something....
something about what I see,
something to turn the water of my words
into the wine of will and risk,
into the bread of blood and blisters,
into the blessedness of deed,
of a cross picked up,
a saviour followed.

Taken from Ted Loder's Guerrillas of Grace

First Sunday of Lent

A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Deuteronomy 26:5-9

Lent - Day 4

Psalm 63:1-8 Deus, Deus meus

1	O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; * my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you, as in a barren and dry land where there is no water.
2	Therefore I have gazed upon you in your holy place, * that I might behold your power and your glory.
3	For your loving-kindness is better than life itself; * my lips shall give you praise.
4	So will I bless you as long as I live * and lift up my hands in your Name.
5	My soul is content, as with marrow and fatness, * and my mouth praises you with joyful lips,
6	When I remember you upon my bed, * and meditate on you in the night watches.
7	For you have been my helper, * and under the shadow of your wings I will rejoice.
8	My soul clings to you; * your right hand holds me fast.

Lent - Day Three

You, Lord, are both lamb and shepherd.
You, Lord, are both prince and slave.
You, peacemaker and swordbringer
of the way you took and gave.
You, the everlasting instant;
you, whom we both scorn and crave.

Taken from the hymn Christus Paradox by Sylvia Dunstan