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This blog started as a 'Lenten Writing Project', where we wrote each day in Lent. Now that Summer is here, let's keep up the discipline of writing with a weekly writing challenge! A prompt will be posted each week and anyone is welcome to join in and post their writing here or participate just by reading it.
Every writer has their own special light to add to this blog and all of your writing offerings are appreciated, whether poetry, prose, essay, thoughts, lists or comments and encouragement.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Lenten Writing Prompt #36
What is a meaningful set-prayer or poem that you pray (Now I lay me down to sleep, etc.)? What is the story around why you pray that prayer? How do you make it meaningful?
One of my favorite authors is Madeleine L’Engle, who tells about praying “The Jesus Prayer” when she had no other words: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
This prayer is the prayer of the blind beggar on the road to Jericho and has been recorded as in use in the Church going back to perhaps 300s and onward.
I find myself praying this prayer frequently when I feel burdened in my heart and do not know for what to pray.
It becomes part of my breathing some days, as praying brings me into God’s presence.
For me, the Lord's Prayer is very meaningful I especially find it so when we all recite it together at church. The use of the words 'us' and 'we' in the prayer reminds us that we are a community.
We do pray this prayer when alone of course, but to me it seems it is one that was meant to be prayed with others.
The prayers that I say repetitively are the Lord's Prayer (which I love) and the 'Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep' prayer with my daughter, which really serves more of a genuflection function at this point because it indicates to my daughters that we are praying and then I get to hear their riff on what is important/special/thankful/needful to them. I grew up with it though, and I know that my husband’s dad and his grandmother did as well, so I really like the generational connection of it.
However, the prayer that I want to memorize and have always loved is ‘Lord Make Me An Instrument of Thy Peace’ from St. Francis of Assisi. I sang a version of that song in a long-ago choir that was almost a chant and I’ve always remembered it and read it in that tune. This prayer is (one of) the basis of who I am as a Christian – at least who I try to be – and it is so beautiful:
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love; for it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
This is interesting, because your mother, and her mother grew up with the same "Now I Lay Me" prayer..., in fact, she is the one who taught it to you...imagine that.:)
I Jesu navn gor vi til bords a spise, drikke pa ditt ord. Deg, Gud til aere, oss til gavn, sa far vi mat i Jesu navn. Amen (pronunciation) ee Yey-soo nah-vn gor vee teel bord oh spee-sa, oh dree-kah poh dee ord. day, (Goo)d teel air-uh, ahss teel gahvn, so for vee maht ee Yay-soo nah-vn. Ah-mayn.
(literally) In Jesus name we go to the table to eat and drink, according to His Word. To God the honor, us the gain, therefore we have food in Jesus name. Amen.
This is a set prayer that I now say at many meals with my parents. It is a Norwegian table prayer that I finally learned after joining Sons of Norway. It's especially appropriate, now that I live in a (mostly) Scandinavian community in Wisconsin.
I used to hear my maternal grandparents say this prayer at the great family gatherings in the summers of my youth. They would say it with their sisters and brothers, and their spouses (many) from Norway. I always wanted to learn it, and it makes me feel closer to my Norwegian heritage. Now, I need to learn a German prayer to go with it, since the next towns over contain my German forbears.
Actually, I do have a set-prayer from my father's side of the family. When my paternal grandmother was 90 years old, I was able to travel the 3000 miles to attend her 90th birthday party. I am her eldest grandchild. Before I returned home, one of the last things we two did together (at her request) was to pray the Lord's Prayer together. She led the prayer, "Our Mother/Father who art in Heaven...". Thank you for that gift, Grandma Heck. s.h.
One of my favorite authors is Madeleine L’Engle, who tells about praying “The Jesus Prayer” when she had no other words: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
ReplyDeleteThis prayer is the prayer of the blind beggar on the road to Jericho and has been recorded as in use in the Church going back to perhaps 300s and onward.
I find myself praying this prayer frequently when I feel burdened in my heart and do not know for what to pray.
It becomes part of my breathing some days, as praying brings me into God’s presence.
by Pat Mason
ReplyDeleteFor me, the Lord's Prayer is very meaningful I especially find it so when we all recite it together at church. The use of the words 'us' and 'we' in the prayer reminds us that we are a community.
We do pray this prayer when alone of course, but to me it seems it is one that was meant to be prayed with others.
Pat, I also think the community aspect is very important.
DeleteThe prayers that I say repetitively are the Lord's Prayer (which I love) and the 'Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep' prayer with my daughter, which really serves more of a genuflection function at this point because it indicates to my daughters that we are praying and then I get to hear their riff on what is important/special/thankful/needful to them. I grew up with it though, and I know that my husband’s dad and his grandmother did as well, so I really like the generational connection of it.
ReplyDeleteHowever, the prayer that I want to memorize and have always loved is ‘Lord Make Me An Instrument of Thy Peace’ from St. Francis of Assisi. I sang a version of that song in a long-ago choir that was almost a chant and I’ve always remembered it and read it in that tune. This prayer is (one of) the basis of who I am as a Christian – at least who I try to be – and it is so beautiful:
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen
This is interesting, because your mother, and her mother grew up with the same "Now I Lay Me" prayer...,
Deletein fact, she is the one who taught it to you...imagine that.:)
Lenten Prompt #36 Wednesday March 28 2012
ReplyDeleteNorwegian Table Prayer
I Jesu navn gor vi til bords
a spise, drikke pa ditt ord.
Deg, Gud til aere, oss til gavn,
sa far vi mat i Jesu navn. Amen
(pronunciation)
ee Yey-soo nah-vn gor vee teel bord
oh spee-sa, oh dree-kah poh dee ord.
day, (Goo)d teel air-uh, ahss teel gahvn,
so for vee maht ee Yay-soo nah-vn. Ah-mayn.
(literally)
In Jesus name we go to the table
to eat and drink, according to His Word.
To God the honor, us the gain,
therefore we have food in Jesus name. Amen.
This is a set prayer that I now say at many meals with my parents. It is a Norwegian table prayer that I finally learned after joining Sons of Norway. It's especially appropriate, now that I live in a (mostly) Scandinavian community in Wisconsin.
I used to hear my maternal grandparents say this prayer at the great family gatherings in the summers of my youth. They would say it with their sisters and brothers, and their spouses (many) from Norway. I always wanted to learn it, and it makes me feel closer to my Norwegian heritage. Now, I need to learn a German prayer to go with it, since the next towns over contain my German forbears.
Actually, I do have a set-prayer from my father's side of the family. When my paternal grandmother was 90 years old, I was able to travel the 3000 miles to attend her 90th birthday party. I am her eldest grandchild. Before I returned home, one of the last things we two did together (at her request) was to pray the Lord's Prayer together. She led the prayer, "Our Mother/Father who art in Heaven...". Thank you for that gift, Grandma Heck.
s.h.