Sunday, November 25, 2018
Quotes from the Problem of Pain
p. 81
We can rest contentedly in our sins and in our stupidities; and anyone who has watched gluttons shoveling down the most exquisite foods as if they did not know what they were eating, will admit that we can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
Quotes from the Problem of Pain
p. 72
The world is a dance in which good, descending from God, is disturbed by evil arising from the creatures, and the resulting conflict is resolved by God's own assumption of the suffering nature which evil produces.
Friday, November 23, 2018
Quotes from the Problem of Pain
George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons, First Series
Intro to Preface
Wednesday, May 09, 2012
Flip-flopping
NPR Piece on "Flip-flopping" and Partisan Psychology: Why Do People Choose Political Loyalties Over Facts?
This is kind of funny, and insightful into our ways of behaving.
Eg. Two-thirds of Republicans believe there is something President Obama can do about gas prices, and two-thirds of Democrats believe he can't... 6 years ago, Three-quarters of Democrats believed there was something President Bush could do about gas prices and three-quarters of Republicans believed there was nothing he could do...
Thursday, April 12, 2012
forgiveness
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Breath Prayer
I mentioned in a post to the church that it can be helpful during fasting (or any difficult time) to have a breath prayer that articulates briefly and succinctly your “cry of the heart” that you can offer up over and over without a lot of forethought.
I gave some examples, such as: "You are my daily bread;" or "I depend on you, Lord;" or "I live by your every word;" or "Fill me Holy Spirit;" or "Good Shepherd, feed me..."
But I forgot to mention the simplest and most common breath prayer: "Lord, have mercy." Obviously, it's our Kyrie, but it comes from the prayer the tax collector prayed in Jesus' Parable in Luke 18 (which is the Ash Wednesday Gospel in the Daily Office Readings, Year II), "God have mercy on me a sinner." Jesus was pointing out that the man that prayed this prayer went home justified, while the Pharisee did not. He prayed something like, "God, thank you for helping me be so great - I fast twice a week and I tithe, and I'm not like that sinner..."
The beautiful "Jesus Prayer," which I think comes out of the Russian Orthodox tradition, developed out of this kyrie - "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me, a sinner." This is another breath prayer, to be prayed continually throughout the day; it can also be used as a focusing prayer - said repeatedly for a few minutes, breathing in during the first part, and breathing out during the second part. Taking in the Lord and his Spirit, as it were, and letting go of sin and disbelief as we exhale...