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<\/p>\nLamott\u2019s orientation to faith and related matters is established early in Plan B<\/em> when she quotes Henri Matisse, who said that \u201cI don\u2019t know if I believe in God or not . . . But the essential thing is to put oneself in a frame of mind which is close to that of prayer.\u201d Matisse is demystifying prayer just as my colleague and I are seeking to demystify faith in our colloquium. Prayer has nothing to do with the content of one\u2019s beliefs and everything to do with orientation and attitude. A \u201cprayerful\u201d attitude is one of what Simone Weil calls \u201cattentiveness,\u201d a deliberate openness to everything that isn\u2019t me and a willingness remove the filters of the ego as I look. As Anne Lamott says in one of her many Ted Talks, \u201ca good definition of God is \u2018not me<\/strong>.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Psalm 19 has always been one of my favorites. Its opening verses invite us to turn our attention upward and outward toward the wonders of creation which, without words or sound, communicates more than could be processed in a lifetime.<\/p>\n The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament show his handiwork.<\/strong> Anne Lamott places prayer in the space that the psalmist is celebrating when she writes that \u201cWhen you pray, you are not starting the conversation from scratch, just remembering to plug back into a conversation that\u2019s always in progress.\u201d<\/p>\n The beginning of Psalm 19 is so powerful that it is easy to forget the many beautiful verses throughout. I particularly love the final verse:<\/p>\n May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, oh Lord, my strength and my redeemer.<\/strong><\/p>\n On the occasions, usually two or three times per year, that I am invited to give a sermon, I always begin with this prayer, including those in attendance in the prayer by concluding with \u201cacceptable in our sight, oh Lord, our strength and our redeemer.\u201d This is also a wonderful prayer to have in mind at the beginning of every class that I teach. It\u2019s good to be reminded that there\u2019s a lot more going on here than just me.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve often said that the season of Epiphany focuses on Jesus\u2019 \u201ccoming out party,\u201d including his baptism in the River Jordan , making water into wine at the wedding at Cana, and the story from Luke\u2019s gospel in which a bunch of people in a Nazareth synagogue find out that there\u2019s a lot more going on than they thought. Jesus is fresh off his forty days and nights of temptation in the desert and returns to Nazareth, his home town. What better place to kick off his ministry?<\/p>\n The scene is powerfully portrayed in the 1977 Franco Zeffirelli television mini-series \u201cJesus of Nazareth.\u201d It\u00a0is the Sabbath, and Jesus is in the synagogue with wall-to-wall men and boys, while the women of the town observe from behind a screen. Although it is apparently not his turn to read, Jesus steps to the front and takes the scroll. After a pregnant pause, he begins to read from Isaiah.<\/p>\n The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord\u2019s favor.<\/strong><\/p>\n When he is finished,\u00a0Jesus rolls up the scroll, makes eye contact with the congregation, and says \u201cToday, in your hearing, this Scripture is fulfilled.\u201d<\/p>\n As the camera slowly pans the faces of those at the synagogue, their expressions pass from piety, to confusion, to outrage and anger. For every man and woman present knows that this scripture can only be fulfilled by the Messiah. And they know who this<\/strong> man is. He is Mary and Joseph\u2019s son. He is a carpenter\u2014a bit odd at times, but just like they are. Nazareth is an insignificant town in an insignificant backwater of the eastern Roman Empire. \u201cI remember when I chased you out of my bakery for stealing a fig,\u201d one thinks. \u201cI remember when I had to break up a squabble between you and my son when you were teenagers,\u201d thinks another. And he has just declared himself to be the son of God. No wonder they tried to kill him.<\/p>\n Christians believe that, despite the appropriate incredulity of his fellow worshippers on that Sabbath, Jesus was indeed the Messiah, God in flesh. Remarkable and astounding. But even more remarkable is that these twenty-five-hundred-year-old words from Isaiah were not only fulfilled by Jesus\u2013they continue to be fulfilled by God in human form. Isaiah\u2019s prophecy foretells a time when healing, justice and liberation will be brought to the sick, oppressed and prisoners.<\/p>\n That time is now<\/strong>, and we<\/strong> are the vehicles of that healing, justice, and liberation. Our world is full of the poor, the bound, those who mourn, those who are in captivity both physically and mentally. We live in a world crying out for liberation, peace, and consolation at every level. So often we wonder where God is, where the divine solution to the never-ending problems and tragedies of our world is to be found.<\/p>\n But we miss the clear answer to our questions. Joan Chittister writes\u00a0that \u201chaving made the world, having given it everything it needs to continue, having brought it to the point of abundance and possibility and dynamism, God left it for us to finish. God left it to us to be the mercy and the justice, the charity and the care, the righteousness and the commitment, all that it will take for people to bring the goodness of God to outweigh the rest.\u201d<\/p>\n We are to be the oil of joy for those who mourn, to be the beauty in the midst of ashes, and to wrap the heavy of heart in the garment of praise. As the closing prayer in each Eucharistic celebration in the Episcopal liturgy asks, \u201csend us now into the world in peace, and grant us strength and courage to love and serve you with gladness and singleness of heart.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Spring semester classes start today. One of my courses is a team-taught colloquium with a colleague from the Political Science department who is also a Dominican priest. We will begin our \u201cFaith and Doubt\u201d colloquium on Thursday with Anne Lamott\u2019s Plan B as we are seeking from the start to provide our students with a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2938,"featured_media":22681,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8,11,14,21,29,30,35,693,40,45,48,61,62,77,86,94,1],"tags":[122,169,221,230,242,289,369,463],"class_list":["post-28749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-baptism","category-beauty","category-bible","category-books","category-christianity","category-episcopal","category-ethics","category-faith","category-freedom","category-god","category-history","category-human-nature","category-literature","category-liturgy","category-prayer","category-silence","category-teaching","category-uncategorized","tag-anne-lamott","tag-christianity","tag-faith","tag-freedom","tag-god","tag-jesus","tag-old-testament","tag-teaching"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nDay to day utters speech, and night to night shows knowledge.
\nThere is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard;
\nyet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.<\/strong><\/p>\n