Daily Common Prayer
As we move through lent this year we invite you to a practice of prayer and scripture that will connect you with God and to other past and present. For more info on the Book of Common Prayer check out the introduction at the end of this post.
March 21, 2015
Under apartheid law, black South African men over the age of sixteen were required to carry a pass card. Anyone found without a card by the police could be arrested. On March 21, 1960, black South African men had planned to leave their pass cards at home, go to the police station, and ask to be arrested in an act of civil disobedience. When the men began their walk to the police station, officers opened fire, killing sixty-nine and injuring hundreds in what has been remembered as the Sharpeville Massacre.
Lord, help us to resist: the madness of our age.
Psalm 106: 47 – 48
Save us, O LORD our God, and gather us from among the nations: that we may give thanks to your holy name and glory in your praise. Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting and to everlasting: and let all the people say, “Amen!” Hallelujah!
Lord, help us to resist: the madness of our age.
Desert father Abba Anthony said, “A time is coming when men will go mad, and when they see someone who is not mad, they will attack him saying, ‘You are mad, you are not like us.’”
Prayers for Others
Our Father
Lord, we remember those who have given their lives for the sake of justice and freedom. Help us not to take our own freedom lightly, but to use it to advocate relentlessly for the freedom of others. Amen.
To practice the whole Daily Common Prayer, you can click here (it includes daily scripture, prayers and reflections)
Introduction to the Book of Common Prayer
Christians have been singing and praying and worshiping together for thousands of years. We can sometimes forget that and view our worship, our prayers as something we do on our own…private.
This year during the Lent season, we want to dive into an exciting, new (for us!) practice…of praying prayers with people around the world, from diverse places, traditions, denominations. We’re going to do this from what is called “The Common Prayer” (www.commonprayer.net), a book with prayers and scriptures for every day, called a “liturgy”.
Liturgy (literally means “the work of the people”) is a communal response to the sacred. Its something we do together, as a way to ground ourselves TOGETHER in Christ.
Every day you will have the chance to join people…in all parts of the world, praying some of these very same prayers. There is strength in numbers, and there is a powerful sense of unity that can come as people from diverse places and circumstances pray together, even though they have never met, and don’t even speak the same language.
We also want to encourage you to do this in community….whenever possible.
So maybe you want to find a common time in your home to pray these prayers and read these scriptures together, or include them at the beginning of your cell gatherings…to remind us that we are NOT on this faith journey alone, but are meant to live our lives in community.