A story about Moses:
He was passing through a forest and he saw a man praying. The man was saying such absurd things that Moses had to stop. What the man was saying was profane, sacrilegious. He was saying, "God, you must be feeling sometimes very alone--I can come and be always with you like a shadow. Why suffer loneliness when I am here? And I am not a useless person either--I will give you a good bath, and I will take all the lice from your hair and your body..."
Lice?! Moses could not believe his ears: what is this man talking about? "And I will cook food for you--everybody likes what I cook. And I will prepare your bed and I will wash your clothes. When you are ill I will take care of you. I will be a mother to you, a wife to you, a servant, a slave--I can be all kinds of things. Just give me a hint so I can come..."
Moses stopped him and said, "What are you doing? To whom are you talking? Lice in God's hair? He needs a bath? Stop this nonsense! This is not prayer. God will be offended by you."
Looking at Moses, the man fell at his feet. He said, "I am sorry. I am an illiterate, ignorant man. I don't know how to pray. Please, you teach me!"
So Moses taught him the right way to pray, and he was very happy because he had put a man on the right track. Happy, puffed up in his ego, Moses went away. And when he was alone in the forest, a thundering voice came from the sky and said, "Moses, I have sent you into the world to bring people to me, to bridge people with me, but not to take my lovers away from me. And that's exactly what you have done. That man is one of the most intimate to me. Go back and apologize. Take your prayer back! You have destroyed the whole beauty of his dialogue. He is sincere, he is loving. His love is true. Whatsoever he was saying, he was saying from his heart, it was not a ritual. Now what you have given to him is just a ritual. He will repeat it but it will be only on the lips; it will not be coming from his being."
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Awareness of the moment should be your prayer. And once you allow that you will start growing and you will know tremendous beauties of prayer. You have entered on the right path.
Prayers, its about Love
The following dialogue is regarding an atheistic view of life and what kind of response a faith should have to this view. The first part of it is a question raised by an atheist who does not accept the organized church's vision of God and it's various derivative forms such as doctrines, creed and the rituals. Yet he does not want to be characterized or defined by materialism.
The second part is a response which acknowledges the genuine quest underlying the question and indeed regards it as a faithfulness - even supporting the inherent skepticism and equating acceptance of creed as another form of idolatry .
It ends with a vision of the future organised religion based on intellectual openness and ongoing quest. Here we go...
John from Tucson, Arizona, writes:
"First let me tell you I am an atheist. Prior to this I was raised in the Roman Catholic tradition and was a member in good standing for approximately the first thirty years of my life at which time I left. The journey I am on has led me in many directions and I have been comfortable lately with where I find myself. That is until I read your recent column. What brings this uncomfortable feeling is your sentence that reads, "As optimism has died, human beings increasingly turned either to fundamentalist religion or to secular materialism in the constant search for meaning." Because I value your understanding of the human condition, I took the latter part of the above sentence as an indictment. I know that my search for meaning has often turned to secular materialism. I must tell you this disturbs me. I'm not sure where to go with this. I cannot return to religion, as it holds nothing for me. Yet I do not want to continue to define myself by what I buy and own. Any insights?"
Dear John,
I do not regard the claim that one is an atheist as anything different from a religious claim. An atheist seems to me to be saying, "The God I meet in organized religion is simply not big enough to be God in the world I now inhabit. Since no one offers a different understanding of God, I will reject the only God who has been presented to me." I believe it is the Church's responsibility to hear that criticism and not to reject it as faithless but faithful.
No one knows who God is or what God is. All any of us know is how we believe we have experienced God. Even then we must face the possibility that our experience is delusional. When the Church says, "This is God and we have this God defined in our creeds and spelled out in our doctrines and dogmas," what you really have is an absolute expression of idolatry. Some Christians believe the Bible has defined God. Other Christians believe the sacred teaching of their church has defined God. Both have inevitably been forced to distort the reality and the mystery of God to come to those conclusions.
As I understand human life, the nature of self-consciousness is to search for meaning and to accept radical insecurity as that part of life that makes us searching creatures. To search is to admit a sense of incompleteness. Religion is one prong of that search but that human sense of insecurity plagues us until we are driven to assert that in our particular religious pathway certainty has been achieved. The witness of history is that when religion claims certainty it turns demonic. That is when you get persecution, excommunication, burning heretics at the stake, religious wars and finally religious acts of terrorism. When religion dies, people turn to material comfort hiding from life's meaninglessness in extensive possessions. I have never met a person, however, who feels that he or she finally has enough things not to seek more.
A third possibility that I commend to you is to see the search for meaning as a journey without end, a walk into the mystery of God. On that walk there are no road maps or directional signs. It is a walk that needs to be taken in the company of fellow seekers. On that journey questions are shared and all answers are challenged. That I believe is what the future of the Church will look like.
For you and those like you, I hope you will find this kind of community somewhere and in it learn that the gift you have to offer the church is the criticism that arises from your atheist perspective. The church should welcome that gift for its own sake and should honor it as a worthy gift that the church needs to receive.
I wish you well on your journey.
-- John Shelby Spong
The second part is a response which acknowledges the genuine quest underlying the question and indeed regards it as a faithfulness - even supporting the inherent skepticism and equating acceptance of creed as another form of idolatry .
It ends with a vision of the future organised religion based on intellectual openness and ongoing quest. Here we go...
John from Tucson, Arizona, writes:
"First let me tell you I am an atheist. Prior to this I was raised in the Roman Catholic tradition and was a member in good standing for approximately the first thirty years of my life at which time I left. The journey I am on has led me in many directions and I have been comfortable lately with where I find myself. That is until I read your recent column. What brings this uncomfortable feeling is your sentence that reads, "As optimism has died, human beings increasingly turned either to fundamentalist religion or to secular materialism in the constant search for meaning." Because I value your understanding of the human condition, I took the latter part of the above sentence as an indictment. I know that my search for meaning has often turned to secular materialism. I must tell you this disturbs me. I'm not sure where to go with this. I cannot return to religion, as it holds nothing for me. Yet I do not want to continue to define myself by what I buy and own. Any insights?"
Dear John,
I do not regard the claim that one is an atheist as anything different from a religious claim. An atheist seems to me to be saying, "The God I meet in organized religion is simply not big enough to be God in the world I now inhabit. Since no one offers a different understanding of God, I will reject the only God who has been presented to me." I believe it is the Church's responsibility to hear that criticism and not to reject it as faithless but faithful.
No one knows who God is or what God is. All any of us know is how we believe we have experienced God. Even then we must face the possibility that our experience is delusional. When the Church says, "This is God and we have this God defined in our creeds and spelled out in our doctrines and dogmas," what you really have is an absolute expression of idolatry. Some Christians believe the Bible has defined God. Other Christians believe the sacred teaching of their church has defined God. Both have inevitably been forced to distort the reality and the mystery of God to come to those conclusions.
As I understand human life, the nature of self-consciousness is to search for meaning and to accept radical insecurity as that part of life that makes us searching creatures. To search is to admit a sense of incompleteness. Religion is one prong of that search but that human sense of insecurity plagues us until we are driven to assert that in our particular religious pathway certainty has been achieved. The witness of history is that when religion claims certainty it turns demonic. That is when you get persecution, excommunication, burning heretics at the stake, religious wars and finally religious acts of terrorism. When religion dies, people turn to material comfort hiding from life's meaninglessness in extensive possessions. I have never met a person, however, who feels that he or she finally has enough things not to seek more.
A third possibility that I commend to you is to see the search for meaning as a journey without end, a walk into the mystery of God. On that walk there are no road maps or directional signs. It is a walk that needs to be taken in the company of fellow seekers. On that journey questions are shared and all answers are challenged. That I believe is what the future of the Church will look like.
For you and those like you, I hope you will find this kind of community somewhere and in it learn that the gift you have to offer the church is the criticism that arises from your atheist perspective. The church should welcome that gift for its own sake and should honor it as a worthy gift that the church needs to receive.
I wish you well on your journey.
-- John Shelby Spong
Fajr Prayer (morning prayer)
A man woke up early in order to pray the Fajr prayer in the masjid. He
got dressed, made his aboloution and was on his way to the masjid.
On his way to the masjid, the man fell and his clothes got dirty. He
got up, brushed himself off, and headed home. At home, he changed his
clothes, made his aboloution, and was, again, on his way to the
masjid.
On his way to the masjid, he fell again and at the same spot! He,
again, got up, brushed himself off and headed home... At home he, once
again, changed his clothes, made his aboloution and was on his way
to the masjid.
On his way to the masjid, he met a man holding a lamp. He asked the
man of his identity and the man replied "I saw you fall twice on your
way to the masjid, so I brought a lamp so I can light your way." The
first man thanked him profusively and the two where on their way to
the masjid.
Once at the masjid, the first man asked the man with the lamp to come
in and pray Fajr with him. The second man refused. The first man asked
him a couple more times and, again, the answer was the same. The first
man asked him why he did not wish to come in and pray.
The man replied "I am Satan."
The man was shocked at this reply. Satan went on to explain, "I saw
you on your way to the masjid and it was I who made you fall. When you
went home, cleaned yourself and went back on your way to the masjid,
Allah forgave all of your sins. I made you fall a second time,
and even that did not encourage you to stay home, but rather, you went
back on your way to the masjid. Because of that, Allah forgave all the
sins of the people of your household. I was afraid if i made you fall
one more time, then Allah will forgive the sins of the people of your
village, so i made sure that you reached the masjid safely."
So do not let Satan benefit from his actions.
A man woke up early in order to pray the Fajr prayer in the masjid. He
got dressed, made his aboloution and was on his way to the masjid.
On his way to the masjid, the man fell and his clothes got dirty. He
got up, brushed himself off, and headed home. At home, he changed his
clothes, made his aboloution, and was, again, on his way to the
masjid.
On his way to the masjid, he fell again and at the same spot! He,
again, got up, brushed himself off and headed home... At home he, once
again, changed his clothes, made his aboloution and was on his way
to the masjid.
On his way to the masjid, he met a man holding a lamp. He asked the
man of his identity and the man replied "I saw you fall twice on your
way to the masjid, so I brought a lamp so I can light your way." The
first man thanked him profusively and the two where on their way to
the masjid.
Once at the masjid, the first man asked the man with the lamp to come
in and pray Fajr with him. The second man refused. The first man asked
him a couple more times and, again, the answer was the same. The first
man asked him why he did not wish to come in and pray.
The man replied "I am Satan."
The man was shocked at this reply. Satan went on to explain, "I saw
you on your way to the masjid and it was I who made you fall. When you
went home, cleaned yourself and went back on your way to the masjid,
Allah forgave all of your sins. I made you fall a second time,
and even that did not encourage you to stay home, but rather, you went
back on your way to the masjid. Because of that, Allah forgave all the
sins of the people of your household. I was afraid if i made you fall
one more time, then Allah will forgive the sins of the people of your
village, so i made sure that you reached the masjid safely."
So do not let Satan benefit from his actions.
"He who does not love does not know God, for God is love." (1 John 4:8)
"And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him." (1 John 4:16)
Prayer:
Loving Heavenly Father,
I praise because You are the God of love. Fill my heart with Your love abundantly. Grant me Your grace never to go astray from Your love. Let no trials, suffering, hunger, poverty, sorrow separate me from Your divine and everlasting love. I make this humble prayer through the most loving name of loving heavenly Father.
Amen.
"And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him." (1 John 4:16)
Prayer:
Loving Heavenly Father,
I praise because You are the God of love. Fill my heart with Your love abundantly. Grant me Your grace never to go astray from Your love. Let no trials, suffering, hunger, poverty, sorrow separate me from Your divine and everlasting love. I make this humble prayer through the most loving name of loving heavenly Father.
Amen.