Pauses
This evening a few folks gathered in the worship space at Trinity Church for a service of Evening Prayer. Setting aside time for prayer at the beginning and ending of the day has been a spiritual practice across all traditions for millennia. Before human beings began to artificially manipulate the world about them by employing such concepts as "hours, minutes and seconds", the constant was the rising and setting of the sun. To acknowledge the mystery of sleeping and waking as well as pausing to reflect on the day just past seem to be built-in responses of the human psyche.
Who among us hasn't felt that primal sense of awe upon witnessing a sunrise or sunset? And how much more miraculous and mysterious must daybreak and nightfall have seemed before humans were able to use other means to keep the darkness at bay?
The structure of Evening Prayer is fairly simple. A few verses of scripture. A couple of hymns. Formal, historic prayers (called "collects"). A set of petitions and responses called "suffrages". To read the service straight through and sing the brief hymns could be accomplished in under fifteen minutes. But our observance of this time of communal praying took about a half hour tonight.
Why?
Simple.
We allowed time for pauses.
Space to breathe.
To sit with our thoughts,
Our circumstances,
Our concerns,
Our thanksgivings,
Our feelings.
We reconnected
With communal solitude.
While the world continued to
Whiz by outside the sacred space,
Inside Trinity Church there were
Moments of stillness.
Time to catch our breath.
Time to order our thoughts.
Time to be.
Time to pray.
Being still isn't so much on people's minds these days -- there's always more to do than time available. But for a few minutes this evening, as the rays of the setting sun faded into night, I reconnected with a sense of the mystery of life that goes beyond frenetic activity. In those pauses, each person present had the opportunity to connect with the changelessness of God -- and in those moments of connection, briefly touch the timelessness of eternity.
This evening a few folks gathered in the worship space at Trinity Church for a service of Evening Prayer. Setting aside time for prayer at the beginning and ending of the day has been a spiritual practice across all traditions for millennia. Before human beings began to artificially manipulate the world about them by employing such concepts as "hours, minutes and seconds", the constant was the rising and setting of the sun. To acknowledge the mystery of sleeping and waking as well as pausing to reflect on the day just past seem to be built-in responses of the human psyche.
Who among us hasn't felt that primal sense of awe upon witnessing a sunrise or sunset? And how much more miraculous and mysterious must daybreak and nightfall have seemed before humans were able to use other means to keep the darkness at bay?
The structure of Evening Prayer is fairly simple. A few verses of scripture. A couple of hymns. Formal, historic prayers (called "collects"). A set of petitions and responses called "suffrages". To read the service straight through and sing the brief hymns could be accomplished in under fifteen minutes. But our observance of this time of communal praying took about a half hour tonight.
Why?
Simple.
We allowed time for pauses.
Space to breathe.
To sit with our thoughts,
Our circumstances,
Our concerns,
Our thanksgivings,
Our feelings.
We reconnected
With communal solitude.
While the world continued to
Whiz by outside the sacred space,
Inside Trinity Church there were
Moments of stillness.
Time to catch our breath.
Time to order our thoughts.
Time to be.
Time to pray.
Being still isn't so much on people's minds these days -- there's always more to do than time available. But for a few minutes this evening, as the rays of the setting sun faded into night, I reconnected with a sense of the mystery of life that goes beyond frenetic activity. In those pauses, each person present had the opportunity to connect with the changelessness of God -- and in those moments of connection, briefly touch the timelessness of eternity.
posted by FrGaryB | 10:05 PM
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