G look at

YAM BREAKFAST
NOVEMBER 21, 1988
PRACTICAL SPIRITUALITY
CAN I PRAY IN THE SHOWER’?
TOWARD A PRACTICAL SPIRITUALITY

Introduction - What a great titles
—— Sa

Why not?
Sure - and then let's go home - ao
oust a 7 i. Aer olat tte utle Ld VA SWRA. “* aN ie ee)
Although lit has not occurred to me to try it:

since surgery, shower has been difficutt. | I have

enough trouble without worrying about praying...

The title suggest a problem - at least

ambiguity.
— oA

The reference to shower represents assumption

about place -

Z

e.Jare there appropriate places for praying

are the places where we couldn't/shouldn't

Does it really raise the question of any kind
a . oe CYCise ;
of spirituality or spiritual eercise in the midst

of our fast, busy, hurried, harried life -
But first - let's take a look at prayer and
one a eg

what we mean by it — *

Let's acknowledge that we have trouble with

pow yu

e.g. — studies show most people don't do it ~ getaal ie |

y
/

much —
— ~pastoral prayers in worship are tedious,
jong and boring — nap time —
- we are terrified to do it publically, as at

vA
Thanksgiving dinner - OK Jane, you just joined a
|
church, why don't you say grace -
God is great, God is good

let us thank him for this food

™)
My wife's brother's favorite:

Good bread Good-neant weet

te

Good God, let's eat -
. or better yet -
an offering by M. E. Maat
titled a Facetious Thanksgiving Grace by
Hennig Cohen and P. Tristan Coffin
"Yes ma'am, no ma'am - Thank you ma'am, please ¢

open up the turkey's butt and fork out the peas."

Actually — we only did it on special days -

My memory is dinner at Aunt and Uncle's and
old Mr. Fuller who always prayed:

God is great, God is good

Let us thank him for this good

(rhyming it with good) and it never failed to
set my brother and me to giggling and we still say
= pass the food.

And of course there are those ritual

occasional prayers ~ ministers are invited to give

VO a)
banquet invocations mostly ~ which we er in

se nt to do because it is so theologically
dishonest .

What does it mean, after all - to invite the
preacher to open the PTA meeting, or the sports

award banguet with a prayer?

~—put after we've refused a time or two and

tried to explain to the PTA second Vice President
in charge of getting ministers to deliver
invocations that

(y the PTA is a secular organization and doesn't
need a minister

(2y and that if it does, it is full of folk who
could stand up and do it - and that clergy aren't

and shouldn't be | the only ones praying

3) Anhat we don't say is that is this really worth

my missing bedtime with my kids?...
Fe iam
After you try to explain and fail and endure
withering looks of inezdulvhy _ that you aren‘t
delighted to be the community's professional prayer
- a modern Shaml4*~_

You give up ~- do it and become adept at

getting in and out -
ot
The worst ~ long banquets that take a7]

evening and afford no exit -

—_—_—_—s a seas om—

= worst ~ The Lafayette Parade Prayer - 6
degrees, Tong wait {bene started - flares — Wo proud’

Sports banquet ~ with 30% Jews and Sper the
ugly anger of zealous evangelicals because I didn't
Say “in Jesus name."
On the other hand - recently

Chicago Yacht Club - Heart of America

commissioning ¢ boat, crew, Miss [inois} frerra

Museum ~ Junch with Mrs. Bush;/ American College of

—

Surgeons ~ most distinguished surgeons in world —

It's part of task \ con't mind and don't

intend to belittle i it — because it does indicate a

do with God or V’ec Use +. & I'1] get into that

whenever I can and however I can.

It is the most visible expression of prayer

and has absolutely nothing to do with personal,
practical spirituality - as in praying in the

shower . P,
(Chihat. is Praver
Good_guestion - and not easy or simple -

Sade
Disciple ask alee = teach uo and Jesus sayS "Like

—e

this" gives a model a {Pray this - but

—- a

pray like this -

Our Father- Intimate address

Hallowed Adoration-affirm. of

Thy Kinecom come on earth faith of weak-here &
now

Give Us bread God as provider
Forgive us as we forgive Closing the gap

Deliver us from evil God as companion

No minister worth salt doesn't have a series on

L.P. - (except me_- mama told me not to ~ she was
orcs ~
-fond of sermons on L.P.s. I haven't)

But we do use it as fs and over years there has

been a classic pattern for public prayer.

~ —R.C./Epis. prayer is part of liturgy -
written, prepared, gorgeous Vi terature (Book of
Common Prayer)
~Free Church disdain written prayer in name of
ean then der its own careful,
unwritten liturgy... Listen to prayer of
barton! fers sawp

and you'll hear seven-phase, week after
week (it's why we write ours very carefully)
Classic pattern

Adoration

Confession

Thanksgiving

Intercession

Petition for o~
Main problem is that we regard prayer as a-fair of
literature - open to analysis and critique — by
others or ourselves -

So ~ unconcsiously — we think first about how

on

sovA,as
this prayer soars

grammatically - vocabulary —- theology - and

ee

so long as we think this way ~ we'll have trouble

——

with whole notion of spirituality.

So let me define a couple of levels of prayer in
8 ae

the interest of putting us at ease:

LL Pravers of the church - been going on for 2,000

oS

3:

years 41 get to add my voice for a while

-—the gorgeious liturgies\- our best, aesthetically,
theologically - |aer ACLU PUG Alwuybt ta
—— Piz. Cory.

the say_what we want to say
~they become ours ~
repetition has some merit
7.@. invocations and graces
ayers as Honest Expressions of emotion that have
no other way of getting expressed.

the desparate cry of hele —

or ecstatic cry of pleasure and joy

4 Prayer as Conversation with God, free-flow,

mz

unstructured talking with God -
COUSEN |
no aaswering + bringing it all to God - ask -
argue - discuss

Prayer as asking for things you have a sense you

a might not get - like healing, safety, del iverence ~

because God is your Father/Mother — to whom you may

—

bring it all. Fs.
6 preven os Prectictm the ager

~this goes deeper

Prayer ~ as listening in solitude
~being useless _j 'S presence
VA 2/Can empty cup and asking God to fill
being a blank page and asking God to write -

ee

—|. Prayer as a channel throush which God's Jove works:

a powerful thing to know you are being prayed
eget
for
No, I don't believe it's automatic - so that
if enough of us pray - for someone - God is going

to be persuaded by numbers to act, ignoring the

Person seas prays for -
But if I do believe_it_is a channel? in ways
we don't comprehend.
Back to Title - Spirituality
ar way of being

A rediscovering:
el
religious in our time.

Most of us weaned on social activist moded...

faith expressed in lives of faithful obedience,

—_

justice and compassion

with a minimum of piety and praying

and then we discovered that the great social

activists were deeply, mystically spiritual - M. L.

————_ ——

King, D. Bonhoeffer

R. M. Brown's new book explained relationship
between social activist model and piety - in
def inesSpirituality asf "a state of being,
frequently approached through spiritual exercise
and acts of discipline that put people in touch
with See a Reality, not discernable in
ordinary experience, and a deepening of a
relationship with that Reality.

Western Christianity — Says R.M.B. - has been
distorted oi The Great Fallacy

ieee ree

can be divided into 2 realms —

At Ae pecrsssnipe contethethat all reality

spirit as body

holy goth
sacred - profane
heaven as earth

That's not good Hebrew thought \ or early Christian
~ but Hellenistic Christian —- late Paul and after -

-

-The good life is separate from world

ee

—Life in world is evil necessity
ee ee

~Sex - evil necessity

-Spiritual life is apart from world

—

So truly, spiritual life is cloistered \ceribate.

poor, [isolated ~ 7. e. Monastic
ait — — i yan
and Prayer ~- best done apart from world — "=

head bowed ~ eyes closed - hands folded | ——————
—_ —_—_—_

——-

i nore ai

a U i, -

ala
\ Ld du2 lave ~ lolet gud

the focal, action point of prayer is in your heart
or soul -fiwhat to do with rest of you is

problem/so - bow, shut, my)
That model is stil] with us - and it's why we

rd

don't Know what prayer is _and don't do it.

You can't be divided - you can't shut off

everything while you pray -

—

Your stomach runbTe=( ‘what a lovely

. CorrEepim ~
theological 1 when someone's tummy grow 7s

during pastoral prayer!)
se iFoniy model you know is above ~-\you're

not going to be very successful (and certainly

————

won't be praying in shower)

—_—_—_—_ — —

Toward a practical Spirituality

phar tries to remember everything we know about
praying and spirituality

— ————
7.8. a pythm of prayer Cin yprrd arc eva from
wor Id Yin worship and work /or Closet and_shower

and on bus -

\
pri communtey Cow We
Toward Building a prayer life

Reauinenents (ene (warne )

1. The regular practice of solitude

. ae a ———,.

Key elemerXs
a SpirNual friend/guide/director

~a liste {no one listens)

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