A 2nd shot at Malton Place
January 30, 2008 at 10:15 am | In community, conversation, emergent spirituality, emerging church, movement | 9 CommentsTags: community, converstaion, emerging church, movement, spiritual worship
This week (27th Jan) brings a new odyssey of spiritual adventure for our little group of crusaders. We tested some ancient paths with our liturgical Taize singing and then we founded some new ones using a piece of material and stones to represent our prayers rather than verbalising them. The experience was at times sacred, at times inspiring and at times also quite challenging and difficult. It’s a strange realisation how the experience of what is spiritually meaningful is unique for each individual.
Here is a summay of the mornings journeyings:
Taize singing. We divided into our various voice groups and learnt two songs that are sung at the ecumenical community of Taize in France. Each song has four parts – so the melodies take a while to learn but the words are very easy. The song is repeated over and over. We found that once we had learnt our parts, it was easy to get lost in the beauty of the sounds and nuances of the meaning of the words as we repeated them. It was our first time so we decided that this kind of singing was something we needed to carry through in order to fully enter into it.
“Jesus remember me when you come into your kingdom” was the one song.
Nic picked up on this song in a scriptural reading where those words are found. The thief on the cross says it to Jesus before they both die.
Then we spoke about remembrance and forgetting…
We wrote down on a paper the things we remember that we should forget..the things that stand in the way between us and our relationship with God. We symbolically burnt these papers and had a time of open “confession” if you like. It was a meaningful experience. A quote stood out for me:
”Oh God consecrate these ashes; let them be for us, not the remnants of destruction but the refinement of our desire to know you…We welcome your refiner’s fire, remove our wood, hay and stubble and bless our efforts to seek after you. In Christ’s name we pray.”
Most of us have done a couple of sessions of Nia and so we played with the idea of movement in worship. Although there is still much to be discovered in this area – we made a dent I think in expressing symbolically through movement the thoughts and intentions that were coming through in the ealier stages of the meeting.
Finally we prayed for one of our group and instead of using words – we prayed using objects to represent our prayers. This really highlighted for all of us how reliant we are on words to convey intention. The picture of our prayer tied up in material and stones on the floor became quite a poweful picture of the whole group’s prayer for this one member.
For me this session seemed to highlight the importance of symbolism in our expression of prayer, confession and worship.
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Excellent summary.
I’m feeling motivated to pursue the nonverbal language of symbol and intention. We are just starting on this journey and need to honour it.
At the same time, I also want to develop the verbal, but instead of a didactic (teaching) or prescriptive (the oughts) use of words I’d like to see us enter a narrative space where the imagination is engaged. Where we tell and retell stories and evoke images, and refashion an Oral tradition.
It too true how each individual experiences things differently. Often this means we have times where we go in and out of “focus”, but occasionally we hit “no go” areas. It’s the risk we take, and it would be good to factor this in at the outset.
I’ve taken the liberty of adding Andy’s picture to the text.
Comment by Nic Paton — January 30, 2008 #
It sounds like Sunday was a fantastic event. I was getting closer to nature with a mixture of wind, water, mud, grass, sweat… not a pretty picture. I had fun on the adventure race though.
I like the idea of the nonverbal prayer experiment. It also sounds like the Taize experience has been incredible.
So Ange, are you doing the “guided meditation” next time?
Comment by timvictor — January 30, 2008 #
Ange,a excellent posting on what was an most adventurous morning.
I have the words of the short poem that Theresa wrote and read during the passing around of the ashes…
Promise so Beautiful
Words we can trust
Promise so simple
Unclouded by dust
Promise laid out
Just there for the taking
Remember me God
The past I’m forsaking
Comment by fakeexpressionsoftheunkown — January 31, 2008 #
i like what you said about how the use of objects to represent prayers highlights our reliance on words.
the gospel of thomas recounts Christ as saying, “split a piece of wood and i am there”. i extrapolate this to say, “smash two sub-atomic particles together in one of your accelerators and I am there also”.
current scientific experiment & understanding suggests that many sub-atomic particles manifest in spacetime for a fragment of a micro-second, before disappearing.
to where? the physicists cannot say. neither can they say emphatically what light is.
or consciousness.
how fast does thought, and – deeper still – intention, travel? post-einstein we know that energy cannot travel faster than light, but intention?
faith?
love?
hope?
i intuit that these travel faster than light and anything that does so, can travel backwards in time.
imagine that.
“…and their eyes were opened and they recognised Him…”
love to u all.
russ.
Comment by liquidlight — February 3, 2008 #
Russ
Thank you for a big enough heart to partake from so far away.
We miss your insight, your rhythms, your intuitions, your crazy science, your beloved gospel of thomas…
Comment by Nic Paton — February 3, 2008 #
Quantum fluctuation on a Sunday afternoon, beautiful.
To quote Brian Swimme from his book “The universe is a Green Dragon” when asked the question where does Creative Powers come from.
“From the same place that everything comes from. From the place out of which the primeval fireball comes: an empty realm, a mysterious order of reality, a no-thing-ness that is simultaneously the ultimate source of all things.”
Comment by fakeexpressionsoftheunkown — February 3, 2008 #
Hey everyone, spoke to Tim last night. If its alright with all of you I am going to plan a led meditation (looking at four different styles) for Sunday. It will take about 2.5+hours. Please bring your journals and a pen. Everything else I will organise. I’m not sure if we will have much time for anything else so this Sunday will be quite a focussed session. Let me know if you are up for it!!
Comment by squarepig — February 6, 2008 #
Go for it. I’m not sure 2.5 hours is possible, but lets stay attuned.
Comment by nic paton — February 9, 2008 #
Looking forward to it. Also concerned about time, but open to allowing things to flow.
Comment by Andrew — February 9, 2008 #