On praying and the Our Father

On praying  and the Our Father

And I saw in the praying of the prayer that it was not just my prayer, in that moment, but that prayer, prayed in all moments, adding together and cascading over to reach God’s ear; the sum total of all the times the prayer has ever been prayed, the words spoken, uttered in reverance, proclaimed, beseechingly, genuinely, hopefully, desperately, totally, as if following some sacred holy path that leads ever up the mountain to the summit. 

And each time you pray that prayer you arrive at that summit of the prayer, which connects you to God, yet each further time you pray that prayer, the pinnacle is higher, closer, larger, somehow even more pure, swathed in beauty, in power, in spiritual richness. Each word a glistening jewel that reaches out from you and sparkles in God’s mind. 

The power of that prayer is awesome, immense, vast and incomprehensible, because it holds the power of every word ever spoken, by every single person who has spoken it, till it becomes a prayer of massive propensity, for it encompasses the whole world and reaches out to eternity, where it is received and its answer echoes back to you. And that answer is Love. That answer is Peace. That answer is Mercy. That answer is Blessing. And that prayer is whole and complete, for it is the Word of God, manifest in you. 

Thus you are safe and saved. You are heard and answered, you are blessing and you are blessed. In this way your prayer is like a waterfall, flowing constantly, falling ever into the heart of God Himself, so that it is surely felt, surely, known, surely heard, surely experienced. 

Your prayer is ever-flowing, each word expanding, increasing, unstoppable, till it has been received. Therefore never doubt your prayer. And never feel alone, for as you pray so the whole host of heaven and Earth ultimately prays with you. Who could ever refuse to answer such a request, flowing in goodness, flowing in wonder, flowing in the mystery of God Himself?  For this is the mystical reality of prayer, prayer that flows from your heart to the Heart of Love. How could it never not be answered? 

And let us remember when we pray the Our Father particularly, who it was who first uttered this prayer. For it was Jesus himself. Thus as we pray this incredibly intimate prayer, between Father and Son, so we adjoin our words, we adjoin our hearts, we adjoin our spirits to Jesus himself, in his speaking, directly, to his Father and so, we too, are included in that conversation and in the Father’s response. Therefore there can be  nothing between us and God as we pray His prayer, simply because of this gift of pure Love. We too then are wrapped up in the mystery, held in the centre of the Trinity, known and Loved, protected and saved, by this prayer alone. Amen

Let us pray

Let us pray a prayer of healing for ourselves or anyone else that may be in need:

Lord in your mercy
Tenderly heal me.
Lord fill me with your holy Peace
Not of this world.
Lord bless me
With your healing presence.
Restore me now to full health.
Lord strengthen me
With the Power of Your Spirit.
Ease the burdens that I carry.
Lord comfort me
With Your Tender heart.
Release me from all pain.
Lord console me
With the truth of Your love.
May all Mercy be received.
Amen

You are Valuable

IN HONOUR OF ARCHBISHOP OSCAR ROMERO WHO IS TO BE MADE A SAINT TODAY.

Shot in the heart, by the USA backed military, during El Salvador's civil war, Oscar Romero's martyrdom in 1980 has had an enormous influence upon my life.

Here he is, very much echoing what we say on Stonebird about how precious you are and how your presence matters, even if you cannot do anything, move, communicate or think :

"The transcendence that the church preaches is not alienation; it is not going to heaven to think about eternal life and forget about the problems on earth. It’s a transcendence from the human heart. It is entering into the reality of a child, of the poor,of those wearing rags, of the sick, of a hovel,of a shack. It is going to share with them. And from the very heart of misery, of this situation, to transcend it, to elevate it, to promote it, and to say to them, “You aren’t trash. You aren’t marginalized.” It is to say exactly the opposite, “You are valuable.”

Oscar Romero 

For more information on Oscar Romero, please see this powerful video :

https://cac.org/persecuted-for-my-sake-2018-10-14/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2018-10-14+DM&utm_content=2018-10-14+DM+CID_cb381d3d9f79936

Come into the hurting places

Come into the hurting places .... if you will. 

Come gently ...into the hurting places of my body.

Bless them.............. if you will,

Tenderly heal them if you will.

Come now into the hurting places of my heart.

Release the many unshed tears....... if you will.

Fill my vulnerability with your strength .......... if you will.

Come gently now into the hurting places of my mind.

Touch each painful memory with love .......... if you will

Lift my thoughts to higher places if you will.

Come now gently into the hurting places of my soul.

Let your light pour into me ... if you will.

Give me gifts of your spirit ....if you will. 

Come into all the hurting places ........if you will 

and make me whole.

by Linda Crowhurst. 2000.

The Spirit is with me

When I am confused or lost and don’t know which path to take, I wait upon the Lord and find the Spirit is with me. He will bless me. He will guide me. He will always lead me in a path of love. 

For  I am wild as the wind and can trust that the breath of life lives in me and will lead me safely on, held forever n the Heart of Love - the total love of the Trinity.

The Lord guides my feet

The  Spirit guides me. I follow. I flow. I dance, I trust. I do not know the path but the Lord knows the rhythm and guides my feet. All is blessed here on this holy ground I tread upon, with His love ever present, His Spirit shining for me, showing me the way to go.

A Call to the Holy Spirit

The Spirit is freedom, the Spirit is movement, the Spirit is awesome power of Love in action. You 

can feel the presence of the Spirit. It tastes and feels good. Therefore pray in confidence to the Spirit. Pray in His Holy name and know that miracles abound.

A Call to the Holy Spirit

Come Holy Spirit, 

Anoint me with your Love

Come Holy Spirit, 

Reside in me in Power and Tenderness

Come Holy Spirit, 

Inspire me with Truth

Come Holy Spirit, come

Come Holy Spirit,

Give me a Thirst for Justice and Righteousness,

Come, Holy Spirit, 

Shower me with Your gifts today

Come Holy Spirit,

Lead me and guide me on a path of Light and Truth

Come Holy Spirit, come

Come Holy Spirit 

Help me speak truly and fairly

Come Holy Spirit 

Shield and Protect me from harm

Come Holy Spirit 

Bring miracles of healing with you

Come Holy Spirit, come

Come Holy Spirit,

May your Spirit flow freely within me

Come Holy Spirit, 

Help me see clearly

Come Holy Spirit, 

Let me speak wisely

Come Holy Spirit, come

Come Holy Spirit,

Pray with me, pray in me, pray through me, pray for me

Come Holy Spirit, 

Intercede for me, knowing my every need intimately

Come Holy Spirit, 

Bless me with your ever-giving presence

Come Holy Spirit, come

Come Holy Spirit,

Touch me with your essence, make me whole and complete

Come Holy Spirit

Burn in me with a Passion to know God totally

Come Holy Spirit,

In every moment be with me.

Come Holy Spirit, come

Amen

Calling you home.

I learned all I know about joy, bliss, excitement, daring, wildness from the flowers. In the beginning the days of stories and adventures, there was  the lavender and me and the sunshine and  the grass smelling of blankets and daisies and roses and fairy tales.

Hedges, high ancient walls, Autumn leaves, trees , rivers and ponds to contemplate,jam jars to fill.

Always the clouds. Why did I look up so much I wonder?

They called it “God”.

And told me He was in a box inside the Church.

As if I had done something wrong then, I tried to please. Him.

That was impossible!

More than sixty years passed, before I knew that.

He is not in the box; the box the Church, the garden, the adventures, the tabpoles, the clouds, me and you are enraptured by Him as He is enraptured by Them and They are enraptured by Us.

The flowers teach you this, when you are very young and when you are very old , if you are lucky you listen again to them.

Calling you home.

When There Are No Words

When there are no words in my head,

No thoughts in my mind , no idea of what can help me now,
May I turn to you Lord, in loving confidence
Trusting that you will come to my aid
And know exactly what I need to get me through
Even the most challenging of moments. Amen

Let Us Not Limit Our Request For Blessings

Oh Heart of Love, oh Mighty Trinity
Bless our lives in unimagined ways.
‘ LET US NOT LIMIT OUR REQUEST FOR BLESSINGS ’

What is a blessing if not an unimagined gift, something new, vibrant, alive, special, bringing hope, comfort, joy, strength: a renewing of the day by means of an unexpected moment of goodness that can lift and transfigure your life, change perception, bring new clarity, help to see a different view, give strength of purpose, shine light in a dark tunnel, receive an unexpected present, accept a kind word rightly timed, be touched by a miracle of healing, find a saving from distress, gain help in the bearing of intractable pain.

A blessing has myriad forms and is perfect for the receiver, each individual has their own special need and we can trust that any blessing given by God will be just right for that person, in that moment, in that way. For such is the intimacy of relationship with God and such the span of love and awareness of the Holy Three, that each blessing will be perfect for the one in need.

Therefore let us not limit our requests for blessings for ourselves or others, but rely on the absolute Knowledge of the Heart of Love to bless us again and again, in perfect and absolute abundance!

Amen

(From the book : Living in the Heart of Love”)
http://www.holyway.co.uk/love/index.html

These two hands, have been through 25 years of hell, but have never let go of reaching out.

Stonebird is how we have fought back.

 Holy Way is how we have survived.

 We have learned a great deal about the power of love, in an impossible situation, one of unbearable, never-ending agony and inability.

 That is the learning we share in our new book : “Living in the Heart of Love”.

What is Prayer?

MY HEAD IS COMPRESSED by the illness. All thought is an effort against the

crushing pressure of nothingness that oppresses my mind where thought and aliveness, light and brilliance should be.

My body thumps its painful rhythm in time with my heartbeat, truly I struggle in these moments. I seek God innerly in the gloom. I look with inner vision through the heavy fog for the golden glow of His Love. I feel that golden light, His Presence, gently holding me. My heart is golden yet with warm feelings to dispel the outward chill of numbness, paralysis, pain.

What then is prayer in this place of no thought? A few stumbling words perhaps. Yet still above, beyond, within this tormenting existence is His Presence, alive with beauty and oneness. This then is my prayer.

The wonder of His Being, present in all of me, radiating holiness, despite the physical suffering. Let me feel you oh Lord.

Amen

Living On The Edge

THOSE WHO LIVE ON the edge, those who suffer without end, those who experience profound persecution, abuse, oppression, discrimination, those who hang, stripped naked on a Cross, do not find it easy, sometimes, to think clearly, systematically about what to do, if anything.

When you are nailed to the wood, the suffering is intense.

In such circumstances, it is hard to face our own nakedness, our inadequacy of response, our weakness, our fragility, our own helplessness in the face of injustice.

WE MIGHT WRITE. “WE ARE THINKING OF YOU”, “LOVE AND HUGS”, SAY A QUICK PRAYER, BUT IS THAT WHAT YOU SAY TO SOMEONE BEING CRUCIFIED ON A CROSS OF UNIMAGINABLE PAIN?

It is hard to find words that can meet the need and what difference can we make, if any? We have to ask ourselves, how can we truly be present in the face of grief and outrage?

Jesus once said that he had come to light a fire; how he wished it was burning. (Lk 12:49)

What kind of fire burns in my heart: is it a pleasant-enough warmth or is there a flaming torch in my hand: the torch, the sword of the Spirit, inspired by love?

Wielding the sword of the Spirit, protected by the Breastplate of Integrity and the Buckler of Truth, we go forward into battle, seeking and speaking the Truth.

No Words

Her pain is terrible today, her tears a fire, it is impossible to see the soft summer morning’s beauty, the gentle shadows, such is her agony.

Another day lost.

I have run out of words to pray.

We Hold Onto Love At The Centre

All is stripped away from us by the circumstances and experience of this illness.

The love, the open-heart of the carer for the beloved is a wound that brings forth the greatest compassion and untold wisdom in the world of suffering. It brings clear sight of injustice and calls for the need for Truth and Integrity on the path ahead.

The sufferer too lies pinioned in pain on the Cross with Christ. Each throb of pain is an onslaught and a torture.

Each moment of inability, of incapacitating paralysis, breathlessness, is a moment of shared anguish with the Lord.

Each second of spreading numbness, pushes the sufferer further away from the world . Each exquisite level of torture played out on the person with Severe ME is a part of the suffering Christ on the Cross. There is no separation from the hurt of the world, for the Lord, the carer, the sufferer, all are bound in agony by their experience and by their love for each other.

God loves us. Of this be certain. God knows all our pain. Of this be certain too.
We are all bound to the Cross in His intimacy of suffering.

Few remain with us.

The pain of the Cross is very real. The sacrifice of the one who loves is immense, the carer who loves and stays despite the pain and torment he both sees and feels, is ravaged daily by the storms of the Cross.

Few remain, yet all are loved. We hold to the Cross. We cling to each other and spiritually our need is great. Our hearts are all open. For whom can we turn to in such suffering other than to God ?

Even if it feels like He has abandoned us, this not so. We cannot always bear nor understand the level of distress and pain we suffer, yet we can hold fast to the truth.

We can bear our suffering with love at the centre. We can know in all certainty that even if we know not how we will cope yet still we will cope and more than this, great gifts of goodness, great spiritual blessings, will flow from our steadfastness to love.

And that is all we must focus on. The Heart of Love, feeling our pain, becoming our pain, being all pain. And finally the Heart of Love healing all pain.

We may not feel healed. We may not feel God’s presence, even in the darkest depths of suffering, yet truly the Light of the World is with us and He bears all hurt for all time and as we enter too into this mystery with Him, so we are all saved.

For Love, though it appears to fail on the Cross of Good Friday will ultimately triumph and leads us always on to the Glory of God, to Light, to Healing, to Hope, to Mercy.

How Much We Need Hope

A life without hope is a desperate, oppressive place to be, with little meaning or direction. When things go well, hope flies high, yet when things go badly, hope can disappear amongst the jangling discordant chaos that ensues.

This then is the time to seek hope, to hold on to any seed of goodness within or without you that might bless and alter the dismal, bleak and crushing suffering that can destroy it or cover it over so deep it seems lost.

This then, is where we need God’s aid – for when we can find no hope of our own volition and despair looms too large to block it out, here then the Lord can save us by filling us with His hope.

Hope that brings light, truth, strength, wisdom, comfort; hope that is all powerful, a saving grace from all three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit bringing not only hope but proactive hope carried on the wings of the Spirit, to bring change to the most desperate of moments, for hope is Love in action, come to unite us with all that is good.

May it pour out upon us and renew and strengthen us. Amen

True Suffering

True suffering is unrelievable. If there are choices that can save you, look for them and make them, God will always help you.

But if not, then throw yourself on God’s mercy and His love, immerse yourself in the Heart of love and there place your awareness, that the suffering you are forced to endure, which may be or become totally intolerable, unbearable, tormenting, tortuous, deeply disturbing, not destroy or despair you.

Here you find God’s grace, touching you in the formless void of inexpressible agony.

For only One who has suffered depths of indescribable, annihilating torment, yet been sustained by love and remained loving still in His heart, can reach out to you and touch you and bless you in that moment that you most need it, whether through the caring of others or through the grain of hope that remains or is found in the depths of emptiness, whether the means to keep going on, in intractable pain, is miraculously present, whether kindness unexpected blesses your life and helps bring much needed comfort and sense of communion, not desperate isolation.

This then is what we pray for, to be given strength in utter weakness, to receive light in the darkness of moments, to accept hope in the desert of despair, to be touched with love in the secret, hidden depths within us, that are in desperate need for comfort, to feel known, seen, heard, cared for in Spirit and in life, to receive multi-layered healing, to find new awareness, possible paths to move forward, to break stuckness, limitation, lostness and feel found in the centre of your being, by God Himself and all who know Him, to cope and still endure the unendurable, for love lives with us.

Amen

Resurrection and Suffering

What does Easter-time mean when the one you love faces yet another day of screamingly awful, unimaginable physical torment ?

What, exactly, is there to celebrate, all the time she hangs, nailed, in agony, to a cross of gross medical, social and political neglect and denial, lies, manipulation and deceit, spanning decades ?

What does resurrection mean, in this place of no prayer, of no thought, of naked,  by the moments in between pain and hours by the restless shifting into ever more extreme levels of suffering ?stripped to the bone, nerve-throbbing-being, where minutes are measured

You might think I am crazy. But on my bike yesterday, Easter day, battling through a strong, cold headwind, I fancied I heard a patch of bright yellow dandelions, singing their hearts out ! Then a pair of black and white gulls, I am no bird expert, darted right across me, I felt their joy.

Another bird soared up high where the clouds hung ragged and broken. A song was born in me.

What was it Jesus said  on Palm Sunday : “Even the stones will ring out !!”

It is not written yet, but I have had a go on the dulcimer and I know the chorus is : “The Light has broken through !”

Yes, that is why Easter is so painful for us, yet so full of hope, so critically, so infinitely important.

You learn a great deal about the mystery of the Cross here, that it is so much more than pain; it is the light , the truth, the wisdom and the power of God , shining forth from what is the ultimate healing moment for all mankind.

A friend, who also knows great suffering, phoned yesterday, I am so inspired by his words : “Life is full of small miracles.”

Here Is Church

The spread in the Guardian was a dramatic 360 degree view of St Peter’s Basilica, Rome, hundreds of priests, Pope Francis leading a splendid, in every sense of the term, Holy Thursday service. 

I was captivated by the amazing photo. It awoke fond memories of Church.

But something in that Holy of Holies was out of place. Then I saw it, right in the foreground the priest with his mobile phone , held up up high , filming or taking a picture, or searching for a signal, I don’t know. But it was sad.

It made me think of Linda and how she might be if she could be there.

But she can never go to a Church, never mind Rome. Her world is a cast-off, battered, old settee and the one room.

But when she prays, when she speaks of her encounter with God in suffering, it feels like the holiest place anywhere.

There is enormous stillness , intimate presence, the space between us suffused with the golden radiance in her deep brown eyes and the power of truth, spirit, knowledge and light sparkling there.

Here is sacred, fragile ground. The slightest wrong movement or word on my part is enough to send her plummeting into screamingly awful depths of paralysis and pain.

Here is Church, here is God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit humbly with us. The very air holding its breath.

The eternal silence. Our little room

Tend Your Life

Take a moment to be still.Calm your thoughts.
Look innerly toward God.
Ask the Holy Spirit to come and be with you, to transform your life, this day and always
Feel the Father holding you gently, encouraging you to open to His Loving presence.
See the face of Christ before you, looking at you with such compassion.
And share with them all, in whichever way you can, whatever burdens you are carrying, right now, however small or large or seemingly impossibly huge.

Stop and give yourself the space to do that.

If you feel that you need forgiveness, ask.
If you feel that you need comfort, it will be given.
If you feel you need help, name it.
If you feel you need love, open and receive it.
If you feel you need healing, claim it.

Know that the awesome Power of the Trinity is with you and will help you.
Each one brings a unique gift to you.
They will hold you in the Very Heart of Love where all mercy flows and love is complete.

They will see your need, even if you cannot articulate it fully and they will respond with power and grace.

They will hear and see you.

The Spirit will rest upon you and we ask that you feel that loving energy in a gentle tender way, today, right now.

Feel your burdens touched by love as you move through this day.
Remember the Heart of Love is real and ever present, waiting to come to your aid.
Only ask then wait.
Somehow love will touch you.
May your day be blessed.
Amen

Father hear me
Son see me
Spirit guide me
Thank you!
Amen