Vacare Deo

As did the home in Bethany,

so does our planet Earth

provide shelter, safety, hospitality.

 

As Jesus gave honour, hope, and love

to this vulnerable family,

so we give honour, hope and care

to this vulnerable Creation.

 

 

Call to Prayer

Come, let’s climb God’s Mountain,

go to the House of the God of Jacob.

He’ll show us the way he works so we can live the way we’re made.

Zion’s the source of the revelation.

God’s Message comes from Jerusalem.

He’ll settle things fairly between nations.

He’ll make things right between many peoples.

They’ll turn their swords into shovels, their spears into hoes.

No more will nation fight nation; they won’t play war anymore.

Come, family of Jacob, let’s live in the light of God.

(Isaiah 2-5 The Message)

 

 

Silence and stillness

As you enter silence, breathing normally with your sacred word,

consent to God’s presence and action within.

When thoughts pop up, or if you nod off,

gently return to your sacred word.

 

 

Taizé chant: Wait for the Lord, whose day is near.  (Click here to listen to the chant)

Wait for the Lord, whose day is near

Wait for the Lord, keep watch, take heart.

 

 

Psalm 8  Click below to listen to the psalm, or click here to read it.

 

 

For reflection:

Day 1: Active care and contemplative devotion?

Day 2: Future hope and present reality?

Day 3: News commentary: Progress towards planetary health

Day 4: Extravagant waste and loving celebration?

Day 5: The Bethany family’s journey, my journey

 

Response

We pray for the fragile ecology

of the heart and mind. The sense of meaning.

So finely assembled and balanced

and so easily overturned.

The careful ongoing construction of love.

As painful and exhausting as the struggle for truth

and as easily abandoned.

Hard fought and won are the shifting sands of this ecology.

Easy to desecrate and difficult to defend,

this vulnerable joy, this exposed faith, this precious order.

This sanity.

We shall be careful.

With others and with ourselves.

AMEN

 Leunig, A Common Prayer

 

Taizé chant: Wait for the Lord, whose day is near.

 

Closing prayer

Dear God

We celebrate spring’s returning and the rejuvenation of the natural world.

Let us be moved by this vast and gentle insistence

that goodness shall return,

that warmth and life shall succeed,

and help us to understand our place within this miracle.

 

Let us see that as a bird now builds its nest, bravely,

with bits and pieces, so we must build human faith.

It is our simple duty;

it is the highest art;

it is our natural and vital role within the miracle of spring:

the creation of faith.

AMEN

Leunig, A Common Prayer