Jesus, fellow traveller and friend,

you step out boldly on your journey,

chiding our fickleness and fear.

As you mark out the road ahead,

consecrate us as your companions,

so that we keep you in our sight

as our pattern and our guide.

Teach us to tread your paths of service,

granting us courage to follow you,

even to the foot of the cross,

to the place where, in pain,

the glory of your way is revealed.

Clare Amos

There’s an unmissable gear-change in the ninth chapter of Luke’s gospel. Jesus had just spoken with brutal clarity about his impending death.  And then, he “set his face” towards Jerusalem (9.51), a phrase conveying that the path will be a hard and stony one, that bitter suffering lies at its end but also that those who tread it must be grittily determined, as unflinching as flint. The direction of travel is set. To the cross. But will his friends travel with him?

Tolkien fans may be reminded of Frodo Baggins, the little hobbit who sets out on an uncertain journey. “The Road goes ever on and on,” sings Frodo, “down from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow, if I can, pursuing it with eager feet, until it joins some larger way where many paths and errands meet. And whither then? I cannot say.”

Frodo’s friends, though given the chance to stay safely at home, “set their face” with his. Will we do so with Jesus? Clare Amos’ prayer asks him to “consecrate us as (his) companions”. It’s a brilliant line. As well as acknowledging our need for blessing as we set our faces with his towards Jerusalem, it reminds us of food offered for the journey. For “com-panions” are, literally, those who share bread together, and our “consecrated” bread is Jesus himself. Strengthened by him, we might make it “even to the foot of the cross”.   

In Bach’s cantata Sehet, wir gehn hinauf gen Jerusalem we hear two voices who will not abandon Jesus. Their faces are set with his.

Our mother who is among us,

we dare not try to name you.

Your reign of love be made real,

on earth and in our lives.

May your longing be our longing.

Give us what we need for living today.

Forgive us for not loving ourselves,

and for not being as loving to others

as you are to us.

Be near to us in our trials,

and birth within us what it takes to confront evil.

For yours is the family of love

we claim as our power and honour.

Amen

Carol Bradsen

On Mothering Sunday, here’s another re-working of the Lord’s Prayer, this time drawing on a long tradition (Isaiah, Anselm and Mother Julian for instance, as well as Jesus himself) which finds in motherhood a powerfully resonant picture of God. The familiar ground of the Lord’s Prayer has shifted in several significant ways. What stands out for you? Perhaps, as well as the obvious shift from ‘Father’ to ‘Mother’, it’s the fact that God is not ‘in heaven’ but ‘among us’; or that the prayer seeks God’s forgiveness for ‘not loving ourselves’; or that it asks God to ‘birth’ in us ‘what it takes to confront evil’. As always, reworked familiar phrases invite fresh insight.

The intentional inclusion in our God-language of traditionally female attributes is something which the theologian Henri Nouwen also saw in Rembrandt’s The Return of the Prodigal, pictured here. Jesus had used this story of the unconditional welcome of the lost son (Luke 15.11-32), to illustrate God’s “outrageous mercy”. Is Rembrandt making a further point? “As soon as I recognised the difference between the father’s two hands,” Nouwen wrote, “a new world of meaning opened for me.” By giving him one strong, muscular hand, and one softer and more delicate hand, Rembrandt seems to say that in this God-like figure “both fatherhood and motherhood are fully present”. It’s a point also made by Shirley Erena Murray - especially in verses two and three of her hymn.

I weave a silence on to my lips

I weave a silence into my mind

I weave a silence within my heart

I close my ears to distractions

I close my eyes to attractions

I close my heart to temptations

Calm me Lord as you stilled the storm

Still me Lord, keep me from harm

Let all the tumult within me cease

Enfold me Lord, in your peace.  

David Adam

This is a prayer for use before prayer. In its first section, David Adam draws on the repeating patterns and images of the Celtic tradition, the weaving in his words echoing ancient designs in stone or silver, for example. He encourages us to gather ourselves, and to become aware of the clamour besieging us from all directions before gently laying each separate noise aside. Imagine this first section being read slowly with space between each line for the weaving, for the closing.

The prayer’s concluding four lines take us to Lake Galilee. A violent storm has whipped up (Luke 8.22-25). The disciples are tempest-tossed. For a moment, we’re in their little fishing boat with them, sharing their fear of drowning and their indignation as Jesus sleeps. “Wake up and do something!” we see them pleading in the foreground of Rembrandt’s painting above (1633). Our own storms may not involve lashing rains and howling winds but are no less overwhelming for that.  So these lines ask Jesus to still us when – in whatever way - we are in danger of being swamped.

Margaret Rizza has set these last four lines to music.  She marks her chant ‘tranquil’ for, with Jesus in our boat, tumult never has the last word. A great calm descends. In Mother Julian’s words, “God did not say we would not be tempest-tossed: he did say we would not be overcome”.

Hail Mary, full of grace,

the Lord is with thee.

Blessed art thou amongst women,

and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God,

pray for us sinners,

now and at the hour of our death.

Amen

Ave Maria, gratia plena,

Dominus tecum.

Benedicta tu in mulieribus,

et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei,

ora pro nobis peccatoribus,

nunc et in hora mortis nostrae.

Amen

"At the beginning of the re-creation of the world, there is a dialogue between God and a single woman," notes Pope Francis. And today, nine calendar months before Christmas Day, the Church remembers that dialogue. It not only heralded Mary’s world-transforming pregnancy but also brought to birth a prayer which is central to the worshipping life of millions of Christians across the globe.

In Simone Martini’s 1333 painting here, we can just make out a few of the Latin words with which that prayer opens. The angel kneels before Mary, olive branch in hand. Despite this peace offering, she shrinks away from him, pulling her hood protectively around her chin. And crossing the elegant vase of lilies symbolising Mary’s purity, Gabriel’s greeting spills out of his mouth in a golden stream of letters: “AVE GRATIA PLENA DOMINUS TECUM” – “Hail (Mary), full of grace! The Lord is with thee.” (Luke 1.28)

But the Ave Maria as it’s known, or Hail Mary, also draws on a later encounter Mary had high in the Judaean hills with her cousin Elizabeth, also pregnant. As the two women greet each other, Luke tells us that the child in Elizabeth’s womb leapt and that, full of the Holy Spirit, she cried out, “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (1.42). Elizabeth’s womb and words both leaping with excitement, not only confirmed the identity of Mary’s son but also Mary’s own identity - Theotokos, the God-bearer.

Jisas em wasman b'long sipsip,

Em i lukautim mi;

Mi lindaun long gutpela gras,

Na dringim kol wara.

Sapos mi go long ples nogut,

Mi no ken save pret;

Jisas yu stap klostu long mi,

Kros b'long yu helpim mi.

The Lord’s my shepherd, I’ll not want;

he makes me down to lie

in pastures green; he leadeth me

the quiet waters by.

Yea, though I walk through death’s dark vale,

yet will I fear no ill;

for thou art with me, and thy rod

and staff me comfort still.

Papua New Guinea (PNG) is known locally as The Land of the Unexpected. A sheep appearing in this mural was, in some ways, quite an unexpected thing…. there are no sheep in PNG! No shepherds either so, when translated into the language Tok Pisin, ‘The Lord’s my Shepherd’ becomes ‘Jisas’ (Jesus) is my ‘wasman’ (watchman). In the other verse shown here, ‘death’s dark vale’ is a ‘ples nogut’ (a place no good) but ‘I don't have to be afraid,’ continue the Tok Pisin words: ‘Jesus, you are with me and your cross is there to help’.

The cross you see here is painted on the east wall of the Bishop’s Chapel in the capital, Port Moresby, palm trees and a blue-tailed gecko at the feet of the crucified Shepherd, rooting it in Papua New Guinea where life is often precarious. For people there - as everywhere - this hymn and indeed Psalm 23 on which it’s based, is a stirring declaration of trust in an unwaveringly faithful God. Listen below to the wonderfully rich sound of PNG Christians at worship.

The Anglican Church has a strong presence across PNG and there’s been a lively link with the Diocese of Norwich for the last 45 years. You might like to respond to the Bishop of Norwich’s Lent Appeal 2022 in aid of much-needed hospital beds for mothers-to-be in Sag Sag, a community encircled by both dense rainforest and the shores of the South Pacific.

Keep watch, dear Lord,

with those who wake or watch

or weep this night,

and give your angels charge

over those who sleep.

Tend your sick ones,

O Lord Jesus Christ;

rest your weary ones;

bless your dying ones;

soothe your suffering ones;

pity your afflicted ones;

shield your joyous ones.

And all for your love’s sake.

Widely attributed to St Augustine (354-430), today’s prayer is used at Compline (Night Prayer). So as we begin to think about a comfortable bed and sleep’s sweet oblivion, we entrust to God all those for whom the night will be testing in many ways. That memorable trio of words beginning with ‘w’, however, (‘those who watch and wait and weep’) takes us swiftly and surely to the bedsides of the dying.

On this National Day of Reflection, organised by the end-of-life charity Marie Curie, we stand in solidarity with the millions grieving the loss of loved ones during the pandemic. When it was raging most savagely, Augustine’s prayer had a very particular resonance, a resonance explored by Ally Barrett in a hymn she wrote for Passiontide 2020. Covid statistics then were chilling. Churches were shut. The woman in this photo, comforted by a nurse as she weeps beside her dying husband, epitomises the darkness of that time.

Listen below to Ally herself singing her hymn and notice the ways her words draw on Augustine’s prayer - especially in verse two. There are those ‘w’ words again, but she also plays with Augustine’s pleas for support from angels. It’s already arrived, she says, in those medics under their PPE. God is present in these ‘angels disguised’ - watching, tending, resting, blessing, soothing, loving.

Christ our reconciler,

where your children are divided

you also are torn

and your heart is broken

by the world‘s agony:

stretch your wounded hands

in blessing over your people,

drawing them to yourself

and back to one another

in love.

Amen

Since time immemorial, brother has fallen out with brother. In Genesis alone, we read of serious sibling rivalry between Cain and Abel, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brothers. And in a story Jesus himself told (Luke 15. 11-32), despite a father’s unconditional love for each of his two sons, bitter resentment bubbles up like bile.

One of the most painful seams of distress on both sides of the Russian/Ukraine war is that the people of these two nations are con-joined by heritage. They have come from the same cradle, sharing forebears. Their histories are tightly intertwined. Connections are complex and ancient and deep. Many Ukrainians and Russians, therefore, have relatives who are swept up in opposing sides of the conflict. Cousin against cousin, brother against brother.

But in this photo, we see hope. Shaul (left), an Israeli rabbi, has gone into business with his Palestinian friend Ziad. They follow divergent religious pathways emanating from Abraham, their shared forebear in faith, and have lived their entire lives within a culture of profound alienation between Jews and Muslims, but they nonetheless plan to run a farm together just outside Bethlehem, selling vegetables and supporting needy families. Against all the odds they have rekindled their brotherhood.

And in the playing below we hear hope. Two young musicians, one Russian, the other Ukrainian, sit side by side on a piano stool, defiantly affirming their brotherhood, while bringing Mozart beautifully to life.

I do not know how to pray.

I do not know what to say.

I do not have much time.

So?

This candle I light is:

something of what I have

something of my time

something of myself

that I leave before the Lord.

This light that shines

stands for my prayer

that I continue to offer

even as I leave this place.

Who chooses to light a candle in a church? Men as well as women. Young as well as old. Those at society’s edge as well as those who belong easily. Those on the fringes of faith as well as those already deeply committed. Whether it’s relationship breakdown or the troubling diagnosis of a friend; whether it’s a grief that will not lift or scenes on our screens too distressing to bear, the longing for light in darkness unites us.

Lighting a candle is a creative act of defiance, a sign of hope. And it is invaluable when words fail us - as this prayer expresses so clearly.  “Je ne sais pas comment prier,” it begins in French - “I do not know how to pray.” Maybe such a reflection does not technically count as a prayer and yet the simple honesty of the first three lines reveals an open heart and a longing for connection with God which is deeply prayerful in itself.

Those who read these words beside lit candles in churches across France are bound to be encouraged by them and feel connected to those who’ve already read them that day and from whose candle their own candle will be kindled. A human chain of prayer comes into being, linking those who share a deep and often wordless instinct to hold their darkness in the light of Christ.

Listen below to a chant from Taizé about that light.

O most compassionate life-giver,

may we honour and praise you;

may we work with you

to establish your new order

of justice, peace and love.

Give us what we need for growth,

and help us, through forgiving others,

to accept forgiveness.

Strengthen us in the time of testing,

that we may resist all evil,

for all the tenderness, strength and love

are yours, now and for ever.

Amen

Bill Wallace (b 1933)

Bill Wallace is a retired Methodist minister. He’s also a poet exploring ways of bridging gaps between the language of traditional Christianity and that of contemporary culture. Here, he reworks aspects of the Lord’s Prayer which are multi-layered in meaning and association, enabling our return to the original with fresh insight.

Jesus’ word ‘kingdom’, for example, occurs dozens of times in the gospels but he only defines his terms through mysterious similes and stories - wedding guests, pricey pearls, buried treasure, seeds and yeast all playing their part.  He tells his disciples to pray for God’s kingdom to come, while also announcing that it has “come near” (Mt 4.17) and apparently implying that in him ancient longings for God’s reign have been fulfilled. Bill Wallace has had a go at deconstructing some of this dense richness held by the word ‘kingdom’, and in his prayer it becomes God’s ‘new order of justice, peace and love’.

Jesus revealed the radical inclusivity of this ‘new order’ by reaching out to those disdained by the establishment - women and children, the poor, those ethnically and physically ‘different’, and those in the pay of the occupying Romans such as Zacchaeus the tax collector, seen in this Russian fresco. So today, having been helped by Wallace to celebrate the spaciousness of God’s kingdom, we watch the Lord’s Prayer being prayed in British Sign Language and hear children singing David Fanshawe’s setting from his African Sanctus.

Almighty and merciful God,

whose Son became a refugee

and had no place to call his own;

look with mercy on those

who today are fleeing from danger,

homeless and hungry.

Bless those who work to bring them relief;

inspire generosity and compassion

in all our hearts;

and guide the nations of the world

towards that day when all will rejoice

in your Kingdom of justice and of peace;

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

With numerous Old Testament exhortations to ‘welcome the foreigner in your midst’ and Jesus’ own assertion that when we welcome a stranger we welcome him (Mt 25. 35), the Bible is unequivocal about our response to refugees. In any case, as the novelist Khaled Hosseini said (long before anyone foresaw the new tidal wave fleeing Ukraine), “Refugees are mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, with the same hopes and ambitions as us – except that a twist of fate has bound their lives to a global refugee crisis on an unprecedented scale.”

Today’s prayer for refugees, from the Church of England website, is an apt prayer for this day on which we remember St Joseph. For Joseph, like millions today, was forced to flee a violent despot in a desperate bid to protect his young family (Mt 2. 13-18). In the excerpt below from L’Enfance du Christ by Berlioz, a chorus of shepherds sing a blessing as Joseph readies himself to take Mary and Jesus from all that’s familiar and to seek safety in Egypt. Like all refugee families, they left with urgency, fearful, not knowing whether they’d be pursued, or what dangers lay ahead on the road. In their words to the holy family, the shepherds end by singing: “God go with you, God protect you, guide you safely through the wild!” a prayer which we echo with deep feeling for all on the move today.

Living God

where there is waste, let us bring recycling,

where there is recycling, let us bring re-use,

where there is re-use, let us bring sustainability,

where there is sustainability, let us bring justice

where there is justice, let us bring love.

John Polhill

Today is Global Recycling Day, the word ‘global’ emphasising that the way in which we deal with our rubbish can have far-reaching consequences. We see in the photo above an image of paradise lost: plastic from many thousands of miles away polluting a Caribbean idyll, its impact deadly upon marine and coastal biodiversity.

In today’s prayer, we hear strong echoes of another more familiar prayer. John Polhill has himself done a bit of re-cycling, re-using the patterns and rhythms of the Prayer of St Francis which includes lines such as “where there is hatred let me bring love…where there is despair let me bring hope.” How apt that the influence of St Francis, of all people, lies behind this prayer, he whom Pope John Paul II, in 1979, declared the patron saint of ecologists.

A recognition that action is vital also lies behind this prayer. It implicitly acknowledges that, in Isaiah’s words, “The earth lies polluted by its inhabitants, who have broken its laws and disrupted its order” (24.5). And then it invites God to direct our daily behaviours for the good of all creation. When we are hasty about waste and thoughtless about throwaways; when we are careless about consumption and choose convenience over compassion, Polhill’s prayer urges us to adopt a chain of globe-healing actions… ‘Waste’ is transformed into ‘love’ in the short space of five lines.

Christ be with me, Christ within me

Christ behind me, Christ before me

Christ beside me, Christ to win me

Christ to comfort and restore me

Christ above me, Christ beneath me

Christ in quiet, Christ in danger

Christ in hearts of all that love me

Christ in mouth of friend and stranger

These words are part of a longer prayer often known as the Lorica (Breastplate) of St Patrick, whom we remember today. They weave in and out, encircling the good times and bad, binding together the already-beloved ones with those still waiting to be welcomed. Threading under and over, rotating around and about, these Celtic words create, as it were, a secure and trusty Celtic knot with no visible beginning or end and an unmissable cross at its heart.

Patrick’s words are as much a declaration as a petition. He knows that Christ is in and with him, come what may. He’s also reminding himself to look beyond himself and find Christ in the face of the other. This mystery of hospitality is spelt out in other similarly ancient Celtic words which, having described the blessing brought to a home by a welcomed stranger, end with a lark singing: “Often, often, often goes the Christ in the stranger’s guise.” 

The conviction we find in Patrick’s prayer about the inescapable closeness of Christ might remind us of St Paul’s defiant words about 400 years earlier. Writing to a tiny persecuted Christian community in Rome, Paul had been unequivocal: “Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8.39). That same quiet strength and assurance also flows out of John Rutter’s setting of Patrick’s prayer.

i thank You God for most this amazing

day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything

which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,

and this is the sun’s birthday; this is the birth

day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay

great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any—lifted from the no

of all nothing—human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and

now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

e.e. cummings

This prayer-poem bubbles with effervescent joy.  It overflows with gratitude for the day’s beauty, the poet’s thanks spilling onto the page in a sparkling stream of words. Cummings (1894-1962), who famously disdained capital letters, nonetheless used them for God and God’s pronouns so that the Godness of God stood out among all his other words.

In 1999, the American composer Eric Whitacre set this prayer-poem to music. The piece begins low and quiet. Then, with the fourth chord comes a frisson of dissonance spotlighting the word ‘God’ and immediately the voices begin to grow, soaring up to the words ‘amazing’ and hanging long and high on ‘day’. Then we hear the ‘leaping’ of the ‘spirits of trees’ before their energy drifts into the dreamy blue of the sky.

Is the poet emerging from a place of darkness and depression perhaps? The piece helps our hearts to soar with his, especially if we can identify with his former ‘deadness’, especially if we too need to ‘come alive’ again.

Listen out on the word ‘wings’ for Whitacre’s delicately shimmering depiction of a fluttering bird. Or butterfly? It leads into a high solo voice repeating, “i thank You God.” On such a day, the poet wonders how any sentient being could doubt God’s existence, could doubt ‘unimaginable You’. Is he recalling Jesus’ words, “Let anyone with ears to hear, listen!” (Luke 14.35) when he tells us that his ears are ‘awake’, his eyes ‘opened’?

Lord Jesus Christ,

Son of God,

have mercy on me,

a sinner.

The 5th-century ‘Jesus Prayer’ is central to the Christian East, and especially to Orthodox spirituality. Christians from all traditions, however, can be drawn to its simple profundity in times of stress or sleeplessness, and as a centring prayer before worship. Those for whom the prayer is a constant companion speak of it becoming the heartbeat of their life, helping them to glimpse what it might mean to ‘pray without ceasing’ (1 Thess 5.17) and changing the way they interact with the world around them.

Its words summarise the Gospel! In the first six, we find God-in-Christ, in the last two we acknowledge our need, and in between stretches a bridge of mercy, balm for the soul. The words, repeated over and over, are often accompanied by bodily actions especially breathing. Inhaling to ‘Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God’ and exhaling to ‘Have mercy on me, a sinner’ can help ground the one praying, ‘bringing the mind into the heart’, the words synchronising with its rhythmic pulse.

In fact, the Jesus Prayer is also known as the Prayer of the Heart and, under that title, John Taverner, himself an Orthodox convert, set it to music for the Icelandic singer Björk. The piece opens with a pumping human heart. Björk then sings the prayer repeatedly first in Greek, then in Coptic and lastly in English. Her raw and primal voice crying out for mercy – ‘el-é-i-son me’ – against the Brodsky Quartet’s calm, steady chordal progression is undeniably powerful.

Bred dina vida vingar,

o, Jesus, över mig,

och låt mig stilla vila

i ve och väl hos dig.

Bli du min ro, min starkhet,

min visdom och mitt råd,

och låt mig alla dagar

få leva av din nåd.

Thy holy wings, O Saviour,

spread gently over me

and let me rest securely -

through good and ill - in thee.

Oh, be my strength and portion,

my rock and hiding place

and let my every moment

be lived within thy grace.

This prayer from Sweden was suggested by the Bishop’s Chaplain in our link Diocese of Luleå. It’s the first verse of a much-loved hymn in the Church of Sweden, one of the few that many still know by heart. Sung to a Swedish folk tune, it’s frequently used at funerals. In fact, its author, Lina Sandell, wrote it in 1860 at a time of great personal mourning. Her father had drowned before her eyes on Lake Vättern, then one of her sisters had died, leaving several small children, and then her mother also.

The hymn’s opening image draws on one used by Jesus himself. Lamenting over Jerusalem, he’d wailed, “How often I longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were not willing.” In a church overlooking Jerusalem (near, perhaps, where Jesus uttered these sorrowful words), the mosaic pictured here is set into the altar. It depicts the same ‘holy wings’ which the hymn describes spreading gently over us ‘through good and ill’.

How apt, then, that the Zoom performance offered here was made during the early months of the pandemic. The soloist, joining in from the hospital, wears her doctor’s uniform. She and all the other members of the Swedish choir La Capella wanted to bring comfort to those who had already lost loved ones, to reassure them that, vulnerable and grieving, they were being gathered up with infinite tenderness by Jesus.

Our Father in heaven

hallowed be your name,

your kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

Forgive us our sins

as we forgive those who sin against us.

Lead us not into temptation

but deliver us from evil.

For the kingdom, the power

and the glory are yours

now and for ever.

Amen

Another Sunday – another look at the prayer-of-all-prayers… Rowan Williams once said that if asked to summarise the Christian faith on the back of an envelope, you could do no better than to write down the Lord’s Prayer. Is it this succinct but all-encompassing quality which makes it the go-to prayer for people in extremis, whether they are tiptoeing round the edges of faith or already fully immersed? Or that they’ve known it since childhood? Or that it came from Jesus himself? Or is it to do with that opening phrase which boldly claims a close, familial relationship with God?    

The Lord’s Prayer tells us that, awaiting the fullness of God’s kingdom, we live in a vulnerable world where there’s uncertainty about tomorrow and evil is powerfully at work. “To stand with dignity and freedom in a world like that,” reflected Williams, “we need to know that God is God, present and powerful and holy, and that we are members of God’s family in an intimate and direct way. With that confidence, that kind of child-like dependence, we’re actually free. We know this is a relationship nothing can break.”

The Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic, Jesus’ mother tongue, sits on the page above (read right to left). And, by clicking on the link below, you’ll get movingly close to hearing what the disciples heard from him. You may also like to listen to a sung version of these words from northern Israel.

Lord,

it is night.

The night is for stillness.

Let us be still in the presence of God.

It is night after a long day.

What has been done has been done;

what has not been done has not been done;

let it be.

The night is dark.

Let our fears of the darkness,

of the world

and of our own lives

rest in you.

The night is quiet.

Let the quietness of your peace

enfold us,

all dear to us,

and all who have no peace.

The night heralds the dawn.

Let us look expectantly to a new day,

new joys,

new possibilities.

In your name we pray.

Amen.

One evening in 1987, after a quarter of a century’s work, the text for a new prayer book was agreed in New Zealand. Why did it take so long? - because the creation of this book offered wonderful opportunities for reparation and reconciliation with the country’s indigenous community. Even to begin to come to terms with the past’s deep woundings of culture and people, much of it in God’s name, took 25 painfully honest years of collaboration with Aboriginal Christians, lovingly crafting a common language of prayer.

On that evening in 1987, the Commission for Prayer Book Revision had asked their Secretary, the Revd John Williamson, to lead them in prayer one last time. So he scribbled down a prayer – this prayer – and prayed it with them. Yes, it was a night prayer but, in its phrases and cadences, they heard the ending not just of day but of their long years of intense work; they heard the herald not just of dawn but of hope and healing.

All present were very moved. “This belongs in our prayerbook!” cried one. Williamson’s prayer had to be retrieved from the waste bin that night, but has now become beloved to many, perhaps the star of A New Zealand Prayer Book/ He Karakia Mihinare o Aotearoa. As the skies darken and another day comes to a close, struggle and striving are laid down. Instead… stillness, acceptance, peace and the assurance of a new morning.

O God, give me strength to be

victorious over myself

for nothing may chain me to this life.

O guide my spirit,

and raise me from these dark depths,

that my soul,

transported through your wisdom

may fearlessly struggle upward

in fiery flight.

For you alone understand

and can inspire me.

This is the prayer Beethoven wrote on realising that nothing could be done about his deafness. He was 32. Fame was already his but so now was desperate need. Fearing for his career if word spread, Beethoven avoided almost all social gatherings. “It’s impossible for me to say to people 'I am deaf'," he wrote. "In any other profession it would be easier." The painting here by Carl Schweninger of Beethoven under a glowering sky streaked by lightning also hints heavily at the composer’s fearsome internal storms.   

In this prayer, he calls on God for help. First, he prays for strength not to let his deafness define the rest of his life, not to let it ‘chain’ him. Then he prays that God will raise him ‘from these dark depths’. He asks for guidance in channelling his well-attested ‘fiery’ temperament into a fearless struggle ‘upward’, inspiring us too to try - with God’s help - to rise above our difficulties.  The direct simplicity and trust of the prayer’s last sentence is very touching.

Even as his hearing deteriorated, Beethoven’s prayer was answered and he went on to produce many masterpieces, not least his ninth and final symphony. In the excerpt below (Franz Welser-Möst conducting the Vienna Philharmonic), you can hear something Beethoven himself never heard – his rousing setting in the last movement of Schiller’s uplifting Ode to Joy. ‘Joy’, mind you!

Let us praise the one who created the tortoise!

God our Maker, we praise you for your creation:

for the green earth,

the blue skies and fresh waters.

We praise you for so many different forms of life,

from big animals to small and humble beings,

for the rapid leopard

as well as for the slow tortoise.

In this age of growing speed and unrest

we want to especially praise you

because in your wisdom you created the tortoise,

giving it a slow pace but a long life.

Let us consider the tortoise

learning the lesson it teaches.

Let us value slowness; let us learn patience,

respecting the rhythms of creation.

Steady our pace that we may more readily

consider it, learning new truths for our time.

Amen.

Luca M. Negro (adapted)

For many of us, it’s time which, of all commodities, is the most precious. Time is what we complain most about not having. Even when we live at a frenetic pace, there aren’t enough hours to pack everything in. So it’s all too easy to be tired, anxious and joyless. And it seems the human tendency to let the demands of daily life run us ragged was much the same in Jesus’ time. In fact, he tackled his listeners about it (Mt 6. 25-34). He advised them to ‘consider’ an exquisite lily or a bird on the wing. Paying close, unhurried attention to the natural world might help them to fuss less and trust more, he told them. To rebalance their priorities.

Luca M. Negro’s prayer similarly challenges our priorities, especially that of speed – so closely linked to time. He uses the tortoise to celebrate slowness just as Aesop had done in his famous fable centuries before: despite competing against an athletic hare, it was the slow and steady tortoise who won the race!  

According to the writer Anne Lamott, the most spiritual and subversive human acts against our hyperactive culture are to rest and to laugh. So maybe if Jesus were here today he’d say, “Stop looking at your watches, phones, to-do lists! Stop worrying and hurrying! Consider the tortoise, moving so slowly through its life yet easily making one hundred years!”

Deep peace of the running wave to you

Deep peace of the flowing air to you

Deep peace of the quiet earth to you

Deep peace of the shining stars to you

Deep peace of the gentle night to you

Moon and stars pour their healing light on you

Deep peace of Christ,

the light of the world to you

Not just ‘peace’ but ‘deep’ peace. That’s what this gentle blessing invites God to give, bringing to mind that ‘peace of God which passes all understanding’ which St Paul wrote about in his letter to the Philippians all those years ago (4.7).

The words of the prayer have ancient roots but came to relatively recent prominence when David Adam included a slightly shorter version in The Edge of Glory, one of his collections of prayers in the Celtic tradition. It showcases a key characteristic of Celtic spirituality by emphasising the divine presence in the natural world. The moon and stars, the earth itself, the wind, sea, and sky are all seen as pointers to God, each version of this prayer culminating in a line which blesses those present with nothing less than Christ, the Prince of Peace himself.

In 1978, John Rutter set this prayer to music and A Gaelic Blessing has been an enduringly popular choice at weddings, baptisms and funerals ever since, the serenity of the piece bringing calm, comfort. Listen below to the composer himself conducting the Cambridge Singers.

When these words, spoken or sung, conclude a burial, they have a particular resonance: those grieving around the grave, gathered together in the ‘flowing air’, will just have watched a coffin lowered into the ‘quiet earth’ while entrusting their loved one into the deep peace of Christ.