Tag Archives: prayer

14/03/2024 · 8:26 am

HELLO, LOVE

A few months ago I was listening to an interview on public radio. It was a conversation with an older English actor, one that had been knighted for his long body of work. The interviewer got around to asking him why he chose to still live in the small town where he was reared, rather than in a large city almost anywhere in the world–which certainly was within his reach.

He only paused a moment before he began to tell this story: “I just came home recently, after being in a play that ran for quite some time. I took the train from London to almost the end of the line. When I got off the train, I gathered up my bags and made my way to the cabbies stand. When it was my turn, the cabbie picked up my bags and I got into the back seat. Without hesitation as he got behind the wheel he said cheerfully: ‘Hello Love, where to?’ You see, it was there, in that moment, I felt, I knew, I was home. Not because of any recognition or fanfare, but just because an ordinary working man could turn and say to another ordinary person, ‘Hello, Love’ … and I don’t know any place else in the world that that is so .. or anyplace else in the world that I would feel so very welcome and at home.”

I immediately loved that story. It made me smile. And I found that it didn’t leave me easily, even though it took only a minute or two to listen to. That night when I woke up in the middle of the night (which is my new normal) and I began to pray, ‘Hello Love’, were the first words on my tongue. It made me smile as I thought about how fitting it is to say “hello Love” to Love Itself. And for the next few weeks, when beginning to pray it was my almost involuntary salutation. As the weeks went on, it began to feel so authentic to start my prayer that way. All of the traditional ways: Holy God, Loving Father, Great Creator… had fallen to the side. After so many years, I was surprised how easily they fell.

Then one night when my first few hours of sleep were once more greeted with being awake, I turned to look at my phone to see what time it was. After being satisfied that it was indeed the middle of the night and not morning, I turned to begin my prayer… but before I could get my mind fully awake, I heard “Hello Love.” My eyes were closed and I was smiling in the dark in the dead of night. And I heard it again… “Hello, Love.”

It only took a moment on that night to accept that those words that I heard were not for me to use in my prayer … but rather were words that I was being invited to hear. I was not to be the initiator of this lovely phrase, but its recipient. These were words of comfort and tender calling from Creator to creature. From Love to beloved. And I was still smiling as I settled in to the love I felt.

Another month or so has now gone by and when I wake in those morning watches, “Hello, Love” is still the first thing I hear and I respond in like manner. And as it was from the very first time, I get the same physical response–smiling from ear to ear. I can only hope it will continue to be with me for a long while.

I’m wondering where is it that you feel loved and at home? Where or how do you recognize God’s voice speaking to you? Has there been a time when you thought you were the initiator of prayer but found that you were bidden instead, responding to a greater call?

I am grateful for the many ways God invites me–even when at first I don’t know I am being addressed. And I hope for you to recognize these special moments on your journey.

Sending you love,

Kathleen…. thecelticmonk.

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22/08/2022 · 6:02 am

STOP.APPRECIATE.THANK.SHARE

Golden surf at sunrise August 21, 2022

It’s Sunday morning and Sam and I participated in our sacred ritual. We rose while it was still dark. We dressed for the occasion. We brought along what was required. We partook of what was offered. And we returned home refreshed in body, mind and spirit.

For most of our lives, this ritual was experienced in a building, with lots of people, with traditions, and language, and texts centuries in the making. For almost 30 of those years, I led the ritual with all that I had to offer and a lot of help. But with the beginning of the pandemic, that fell apart. First, my leadership was moved from in-person to on-line. Then life intervened and I simply no longer had a ritual to lead. Not only that, with my autoimmune disease, I am not engaging people in groups of any size indoors. So many changes. Yet, change does not necessarily equal loss.

I’ve summed up our new worship ritual with the four simple words above. Stop. Appreciate. Thank. And Share. We stop what might be our usual daily practice and make our way out into creation. We appreciate, mostly in silence what we find around us. We take it in–and let it wash over us. I often appreciate by not only noticing but capturing in photos. As we take our leave, there’s more silence…grateful silence, thankful silence, worshipful silence. And the important final step, sharing. A disciple not only sees, learns and follows… but shares. My practice of sending a photo to someone is not only prayer, but a sharing of the goodnes, bounty, mercy and love of God.

Man and Best Friend August 21, 2022

There is so much inspiration that is a part of this worship ritual. No hymns, but waves, and birds, and children laughing. I don’t know anyone’s name, but most strangers up at 6:30 a.m. greet one another with a smile and a word as we pass. All around are examples of love, of faithfulness, of beauty, of goodness, of joy. A guy and his dog run north. A dad has brought his young son to fish. Couples sit cross-legged side by side in silence, waiting. A whole family is on their blanket. No one has organized us, but at the moment the sun slips up from the horizon, or comes out from the distant bank of clouds, everyone stops–awe abounds.

Just like I don’t know if/when I’ll ever go back into a retail store, or get on an airplane, I don’t know if/when I will ever be part of a traditional worshiping community. But I do realize, finally, that it’s not about the building, or like-minded people–or even about the rituals and traditions that once sustained me. I realize that I have been graced with all I need to love God, self and neighbor. And just this morning in my appreciative silence, I suddenly hoped that at sometime across my ministry year, I said that, conveyed that, to those before me.

It doesn’t have to be Sunday to STOP. APPRECIATE. THANK. & SHARE. You don’t need to live next to the Atlantic. You don’t even need to love pre-dawn. Just see with your heart. Behold it Trust it. Be grateful. And Share. It’s really that simple.

Sola Deo gloria (Glory to God Alone)

xo Kathleen

thecelticmonk/ JAX BEACH

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13/05/2022 · 5:37 am

Peace, Mercy and Grace to you

I found myself up in the middle of the night, wide awake, with no discernable purpose. This blank page of time doesn’t happen often. If I do wake in the watches of the night there’s usually a reason that rather quickly reveals itself. But not last night. So I began the inventory of the usual suspects… too hot? too cold? numbness or pain? my ‘to do’ list for tomorrow? concerns for a loved one? recent news? the planet? No, I thought. I covered most of those things as I prayed before sleeping. So what’s up–or better yet–why am I up?

My mind wandered around for a while and settled on the words above, words I’d recently written in closing a note to a friend. Now lying on my back watching shadows of water dancing on the ceiling I wondered what I meant by them, by each of them. Good question. What did I mean? And like a row of perfectly placed Dominos… the answers began to fall perfectly as if by design.

The peace I intended to send was a feeling–the feeling of taking a deep breath and feeling one’s whole body responding pleasantly to the increase in oxygen. As I thought of it last night, and as I am writing it now I couldn’t help but taking that kind of breath. The peace that I hoped for my friend was the openness and ease of such breaths, as a part of their life. Yes that was it.

But why mercy? What was I thinking? Too much theological training likely. Thinking about it now, I don’t know if I was hoping they would be the recipient of mercy (compassionate forgiveness) or would dispense it to others. The promise of the Beatitude aside, my experience is that it’s a lifes work to be a person of mercy. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.”

Grace came easily into my hopes and wishes that day. Just as easily as I see it everywhere. I believe that unmerited favor is ours any time we witness something beautiful… in relationships, in nature, in an interaction with a stranger, in silent solitary times, in rush hour traffic, in life’s pedestrian and ecstatic moments. Grace just is–for those who see with their heart. Knowing all these moments of life as grace-filled is something we grow in.

I needed to sort all those things out for some reason at an hour when the almost full moon was high in the western sky making the water outside my window dance a reflection on my ceiling causing the rod and arms of the still ceiling fan look like the petals of a flower blowing in a breeze. I said ‘thank You’ as a response. I was in a moment of grace.

These thoughts led me to the practice of a widening circle prayer. I prayed for this peace, mercy and grace for myself. I prayed for peace, mercy and grace for Sam, sound asleep beside me. I prayed for peace, mercy and grace for my son, daughter-in-law, and grandchildren… pausing to consider what that might look like for each of them (because it is different for all of us). I continued out in widening circles to extended family, to friends, to neighbors, as faces or names came to mind. With the list of folks I knew now nearly exhausted, I continued to consider those I don’t know. Peace, mercy and grace to any who are awake in the middle of the night. Peace, mercy and grace to the lonely. Peace, mercy, and grace to those in places of war or disturbance. Peace, mercy and grace to unjust world leaders. Peace, mercy and grace to those who…

I don’t know who was next. I fell back asleep by the time I got to the unjust leaders and pictured them taking a breath and becoming a little more humane… then experiencing compassionate forgiveness (mercy) being willing to offer it to those over whom they wielded power… and being a recipient of God’s unmeritied favor, I observed them seeing the humanity of every living creature. The world set right, I fell asleep in peace. “I will lie down in peace, and sleep comes at once, for You alone Lord make me dwell in safety.”

There is a name for what I call the widening circle prayer, in Buddhism. I’ve long since forgotten the Sanskrit name. But on a more or less regular basis, I find myself praying this way. I’m not hoping to throw ideas out into an unknown universe, but petitioning the Creator of that universe. Beyond that, I believe my prayer is joining the Creator’s desire as well. The final piece I am aware of more and more, is that I cannot pray for something for myself, that I also don’t wish, hope, or desire for all others. We are all connected. Our well-being depends on the well-being of all. It cannot be any other way.

So to those of you I know, and those of you I don’t; to those of you who are at this moment doing really great and those of you living on the edge; to those of you who need peace or can offer it; who are in need of compassonate forgiveness or can extend it to someone; to those of you who know unmerited favor or aren’t even sure it exists; to all of you I offer Peace, Mercy and Grace today and in all the days to come. And I invite you to make your own widening circle prayer.

With much hope,

Kathleen Bronagh Weller thecelticmonk

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21/07/2011 · 9:20 am

PRAYER: A RADICAL TRUST

Right now I’m reading several books at one time. One is a book on discernment –a very good book I may add; another on Ireland and the Celts; the third on meditation and contemplative prayer. The conflagration of the three has brought me to broach the subject of how to use a discerning heart (or even the spiritual gift of discernment) as I pray for others. It names a struggle I face in my own prayer life: Do I pray for someone in a specific way because they asked me to… or do I take that person, their needs, wants, desires to God and seek God’s best for them? Do I pray that their will be done… or that God’s will be done in their lives.

Sometimes as I pray for something specific that someone has asked, I’m led away from their request and find myself asking God to use their circumstances, need, situation, longing, even illness or grief to bring them closer to Him and His desire for their lives – even if it means they don’t receive what they want right now. At those times, I feel as though I ought to put out a disclaimer to anyone who asks me to pray that says: “I will pray for you. But please know, praying for God’s will to be done… is not necessarily what you’d like to be done.”

Are you brave enough to pray beyond what you can see? Are you willing to turn your needs and the needs of those you love, over to God and His intentions and purposes? Praying this way is more than tacking on “In Jesus’ Name” at the end of our prayer. It’s taking the time and effort to slow down… to seek God’s heart and will… and to listen before, during and after our prayer times for the holiest Spirit. It’s willing to be led in prayer and not be the leader.

But that’s not all, praying in this way includes yet another dimension –and this one inside of us. Because praying this way assumes a radical trust that God loves and knows us, that God is good, that God cares about the details of our lives, and that at any moment what God is allowing to happen in our lives is not for harm…but for good. Do you believe those things? Do you have such a radical trust?

Just this week three people, after sharing some of their life story, asked me to pray for them. As I prayed aloud I asked God to be with them, to heal them (even if they had no physical malady), to lead them and to bless them. As I continue to pray for these folks when they come to mind I’ll pray: “Your will be done, Lord” trusting what God wills and works is beyond anything I could come up with.

I’m becoming more aware that God’s unfathomable love for us includes both crucible and pleasant places. May our absolute trust in God’s goodness lead us to place ourselves and those we love into His tender care. BLESSINGS AND JOY, THE CELTIC MONK

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