Inclusive. Sacred. Authentic.

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1 Praying the Hours - A Lenten spiritual practice Are you looking to connect with your deeper self and the Holy? Do you seek to deepen your connection with God and others? This Lent, we invite you to participate in a four-week daily prayer practice. Our congregation and extended community will engage with a simplified version of the Liturgy of the Hours which dates back to the early Christians and continues to the modern day. Praying the Hours, our spiritual practice for Lent, is a curated collection of prayers, psalms, songs, photos and liturgy designed to help our community pray together wherever we are. Each weekday for four weeks we will share words and images to encourage prayer and contemplation. We will follow the rhythms of the days posting content in the morning, during the day, in the evening and at night. This rich collection takes the best of the old and reinvigorates it with fresh energy for renewal. Special thanks to our contributors: Beth H., Christina W., Linda M., Todd B., Trisha S. and Win K. What. In the weeks leading up to Holy Week, we will examine prayer at Dawn, Day, Dusk and Dark. Our curated and contributed content from the Fairfield United Church community will be shared on our Facebook page and will be available in a booklet at our Sunday gatherings, and as a PDF download on our website. Dawn Hour begins with wonder and rejoicing. This offering is to be recited/viewed upon waking. Day Hour, so full of thanksgiving and rejoicing. This offering is to be said/viewed during the day. Dusk Offering is read/viewed in the early evening and includes beautiful thoughts to end the day. Dark Offering comes right before bed to take you into the night. Why. This practice is intended to nurture connection and ground our community through the ritual of daily, focused prayer during which we open ourselves to the divine presence. Who. Everyone who gathers with us on Sunday or who participates in our community online is encouraged to take part and enrichen this practice. When. From February 26 to March 23, we will post one curated piece of content on Facebook each weekday at 7 am, 1 pm, 6 pm and 8 pm. All are encouraged reflect and engage at these times each weekday during this period. Inclusive. Sacred. Authentic.

2 LECTIO DIVINA: Sacred Reading Steps Silence is the language of God; all else is a poor translation. ~ Rumi Sacred Reading can be used with any sacred text, inspiring poetry, art, or place in nature. All of these can be expressions of the Word. 1. Take a few minutes to come to silence. Allow yourself to feel grounded in the earth, and surrounded by and filled with Divine Light. 2. Read the text twice slowly. 3. Allow a word, phrase or image to land. Trust whatever comes to you. 4. Now with the rhythm of your breath, breathe this word, phrase or image. Allow yourself to chew on the word, to savour it, rolling it over on your tongue. Spend several minutes just breathing the word or phrase. You might start with two or three minutes and then move up to five minutes; and then longer if you wish. 5. When you are ready, let the word/phrase/image go. REST in the silence; rest in the presence of the Divine. No words. No place to go; nothing to do. Take at least one minute or longer. 6. Finally, send out a prayer for whatever you need at this time. This prayer is often inspired by the meditation. Lectio Divina can be very powerful, even transformational. It originated with the Benedictine monks in the 6th century. It is like whole food for the soul. It combines the reading of the passage with meditation: focusing on a particular word/phrase/image. It concludes with contemplation resting in the silence; surrendering to the silence; and then a prayer of thanks or petition. This practice helps us enter into this one moment: the sacrament of the moment. We open ourselves to the Divine Presence however this Presence appears in this one moment. In this pondering, our own emotions or feelings may arise. Stay with these. If we continue to ponder the word/phrase/image throughout the day, the practice continues to work within us. Lectio Divina helps us to gather in our fractured, distracted, noise polluted selves (A Book of Hours, p. 28). It provides us with the opportunity to experience our deep transcendent selves as divine creations. This is the gift of salvation that Jesus promised. Resources: Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours, ed. by Kathleen Deignan. Christine Valters Paintner, Lectio Divina Inclusive. Sacred. Authentic.

3 Monday, March 12 DAWN - 7 am For the will is like a fire, baking each deed as if in a furnace. Bread is baked so that people may be nourished by it and be able to live. So, too, the will is the strength of the whole work, for it starts by kneading it and when it is firm adds the yeast and pounds it severely; and thus, preparing the work in contemplation as if it were bread, it bakes it in perfection by the full action of its ardor, and so makes a greater food for humans in the work they do than in the bread they eat. A person stops eating from time to time, but the work of his will goes on in him till his soul leaves his body. And in whatever different circumstances the work is performed... it always progresses in the will and in the will comes to perfection. ~Hildegard von Bingen, translated by Mother Columba Hart and Jane Bishop, The Soul Aflame, ed. by Phil Cousineau Day - 1 pm Make ready for the Face that speaks like lightning, Uttering the new name of your exultation Deep in the vitals of your soul. Make ready for the Christ, Whose smile, like lightning, Sets free the song of everlasting glory That now sleeps, in your paper flesh, like dynamite. ~ Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours, ed. by Kathleen Deignan DARK - 8 pm Invite the Sacred to participate in your joy in little things, as well as in your agony over the great ones. There are as many miracles to be seen through a microscope as through a telescope. Start with the little things seen through the magnifying glass of wonder, and just as a magnifying glass can focus the sunlight into a burning beam that can set a leaf aflame, so can your focused wonder set you ablaze with insight. Find the light in each other and just fan it. ~ Alice O. Howell, The Soul Aflame, ed. by Phil Cousineau

4 Tuesday, March 13 DAwn - 7 am DAy - 1 pm MORNING IN A NEW LAND In trees still dripping night some nameless birds Woke, shook out their arrowy wings, and sang, Slowly, like finches sifting through a dream. The pink sun fell, like glass, into the fields. Two chestnuts, and a dapple gray, Their shoulders wet with light, their dark hair streaming, Climbed the hill. The last mist fell away, And under the trees, beyond time s brittle drift, I stood like Adam in his lonely garden On that first morning, shaken out of sleep, Rubbing his eyes, listening, parting the leaves, Like tissue on some vast, incredible gift. ~ Mary Oliver, New and Selected Poems: Volume One I HAVE FIVE THINGS TO SAY You are the sky my spirit circles in, The love inside love, the resurrection-place. Let this window be your ear. I have lost consciousness many times with longing for your listening silence, and your life-quickening smile. You give attention to the smallest matters, my suspicious doubts, and to the greatest. THE REAL WORK It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed, The impeded stream is the one that sings. ~ Wendell Berry, Collected Works You know my coins are counterfeit, but you accept them anyway, my impudence and my pretending. Love s secret is always lifting its head out from under the covers, Here I am! ~ Rumi

5 Wednesday, March 14 Dawn - 7 am DAY - 1 pm Oh Source of love and creation Holy is your truth May your wisdom come Your circle be one uniting heaven and earth. Give us today a nurturing spirit Heal through us as we ourselves are healed Lead us into Fullness of life And liberate all that is good For the Wisdom, Presence and Goodness are Yours All: Now and forever Amen I am the utter poverty of God. I am His emptiness, littleness, nothingness, lostness. When this is understood, my life in His freedom, the self-emptying of God in me is the fullness of grace. A love for God that knows no reason because He is God; a love without measure, a love for God as personal. ~ Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours, ed. by Kathleen Deignan ~ Marianne Williamson, Illuminata Earth brings us into life And nourishes us. Earth takes us back again. Birth and death are present in every moment. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh From fecund darkness She brings forth all Dancing form into being Containing the multiverse Within the infinite depths of her womb Enclosing reality with her nurturing arms That life might flower in fullness. ~ Theresa Dintino

6 thursday, March 15 DAwn - 7 am We are warmed by fire, not by the smoke of the fire. We are carried over the sea by a ship, not by the wake of a ship. So too, what we are is to be sought in the invisible depths of our own being, not in our outward reflection in our own acts. ~ Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours, ed. by Kathleen Deignan day - 1 pm Dear God, Thank you for this new day, its beauty and its light. Thank you for my change to begin again. Free me from the limitations of yesterday Today may I be reborn May I become more fully a reflection of Your radiance Give me strength and compassion and courage and wisdom Show me the lights in others and myself. May I recognize the good that is available everywhere May I be, this day, an instrument of love and healing? Lead me into gentle pastures. Give me deep peace that I might serve you most deeply. Amen ~ Marianne Williamson, Illuminata dusk - 6 pm Whatever is happening, tend your body and heart. When you feel overwhelmed move around, stretch, shake your body. Take three full breaths. Return to the present moment. ~ Jack Kornfield, A Lamp In the Darkness PSALM 139 O my Beloved, You have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You discern my innermost thoughts. You find me on the journey and guide my steps; You know my strengths and my weaknesses. Even before words rise up in prayer, Lo, You have already heard my heart call. You encompass me with love wherever I go, And your strength is my shield. Such sensitivity is too wonderful for me; Boundless gratitude is my soul s response. You formed my inward being, You knit me together in my mothers womb. I praise You, Your mysteries fill me with wonder! More than I know myself, You know me; My essence is not hidden from You. When I was being formed in secret, Intricately fashioned from the elements of the earth Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your records were written every one of them, The days that were numbered for me. How precious to me are your creations O Blessed One! Search me, O my Beloved, and know my heart! Try me and discern my thoughts! Help me face the darkness within me; Enlighten me, that I might radiate your love and light! ~ Nan Merrill, Psalms for Praying

7 friday, March 16 Dawn - 7 am DAWN PRAYER (A PRAYER POEM FOR THE NEW DAY) O Lord, The safe light falls, heralding a new day The warm blush carries your everlasting promise I soak in the grace you give At the dawn of each morning. With the sun, hope also rises To cast light into the darkness. Sweet songs flow from skies Emerging in the hazy glow. Sounds of comfort That lead us to wonder again at the beauty all around. A taste of Heaven is poured into each new dawn. We are reminded of new birth, Of your redeeming love And with this wake up call, Each and everyone can trust in The promise of eternity And carry its gentle presence into The day anew. ~ There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is: nor how valulable it is: nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate YOU. Keep the channel open... No artist is pleased... There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine, dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keep us marching and makes us more alive than the others. ~ Martha Graham, The Soul Aflame, ed. by Phil Cousineau DAy - 1 pm GOD IS THE FRIEND OF SILENCE We need to find God, and she cannot be found in noise and restlessness. She is the friend of silence. See how nature trees, flowers grass grows in silence; see the stars, the moon, the sun, how they move in silence we need silence to be able to touch souls. ~ Mother Teresa THE CHRIST SAID The Christ said to us, I have cut you from a garden I tend and set you in a vase for the world to see. Soon you will return, for your glorious presence I miss. My hands need to touch you again, my divine senses and eyes require your soul s beauty near. Forgive me, my love, for the suffering our separation brought. If I said I am in debt to you, could you understand? ~ St. Thomas Aquinas, Daniel Ladinsky s Love Poems From God