Meditation Moment in Eastertide ~ Friday, Week 6 '23

Prayer for a Discouraging World

   When I see the news it appears to me all too often that we really do "love our neighbors as we love ourselves" although not in the way  it’s intended. The world can be such a discouraging place. Everyone I know has their own personal laundry list of the frustrations, disappointments, trials, and tragedies in their everyday lives and then news from here and around the globe is beyond dreadful at times. It serves to push many of us into de-sensitizing and self-medicating in a variety of ways such as the obvious of alcohol or gambling, but also over-indulgence by food or hours of sports or romance tv, any form of too-much escapism. Sometimes, perhaps all too often, we unwittingly engage in self-destructive behaviors such as over-compensating by working too hard on behalf of others that our true personal needs become lost. Also, self-deprecating self-talk learned from others has taught many from a young age that we are never good enough. At the very least we try to avoid and deny some of the all too harsh realities of life. In this all or nothing world of excess in everything, we must find a balance between doing and being, and between caring for others and caring for oneself, in doing the "good that I can do" in appropriate measure.

Let me feel Your breath in my soul, O Lord. Surround me with Your presence and whisper to my heart. Call me out of my hesitation, avoidance, and procrastination to spend a little time with you each day. Kick me out of my whining and self-absorption and draw me closer. Only by consciously, deliberately, and willingly loving You, can I begin to love myself. Then, I can consciously, deliberately, and willingly, love my neighbors and discover what positive differences I truly am able to make in Your world that is also our island home.* amen.

 

*From Eucharistic Prayer C, in part, The Book of Common Prayer, 1979, page 370:

At your command all things came to be: the vast expanse of
interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses,
and this fragile earth, our island home.
By your will they were created and have their being.

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