Author: arampone

The Summer Day

arampone Prayers and Meditations ,

By Mary Oliver

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention,
how to fall down into the grass,
how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed,
how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

Mary Oliver was an American poet.

Prayer for Radical Amazement  

arampone Prayers and Meditations ,

By Abraham Joshua Heschel

Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement.
Get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted.
Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually.
To be spiritual is to be amazed.

Abraham Joshua Heschel was a Polish-American rabbi and one of the leading Jewish theologians and philosophers of the 20th century.

Prayer and Action

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By Rabbi David Saperstein

“In the Jewish tradition, the separation between prayer and action is slight. We’re mindful of the admonition in Isaiah where God says, ‘I don’t want your fast and your sacrifice. I want you to deal your bread to the hungry, tear apart the chains of the oppressed.’

And Leviticus 19 tells us that to be holy in the way God is holy means to set aside a corner of our fields for the poor and homeless, to pay the laborer a timely and fair wage, and to remove stumbling blocks. These are religious activities just as much as prayer is. They are all woven together.

After participating in the civil rights march in Selma, Alabama, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, one of this century’s great religious figures and a close colleague of Martin Luther King, said, ‘It felt like my feet were praying.’ Prayer is not just the communication we have with God; it is also the work we do to make God’s values real to the world. I think God listens to both kinds of prayer with equal joy.”

Rabbi David Saperstein is an American rabbi, lawyer, and Jewish community leader.

Through the Silence of Nature  

arampone Prayers and Meditations ,

By Hazrat Inayat Khan

Through the silence of nature, I attain Thy divine peace.
O sublime nature, in thy stillness let my heart rest.
Thou art patiently awaiting the moment to
manifest through the silence of sublime nature.

O nature sublime, speak to me through silence,
for I am awaiting in silence like you the call of God.
O nature sublime, through thy silence I hear Thy cry.
My heart is tuned to the quietness,
that the stillness of nature inspires.

Hazrat Inayat Khan was an Indian musician, poet, philosopher, and teacher of Sufism.

Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers

arampone Prayers and Meditations

By Anne Lamott

“Prayer is talking to something or anything with which we seek union, even if we are bitter or insane or broken. (In fact, these are probably the best possible conditions under which to pray.) Prayer is taking a chance that against all odds and past history, we are loved and chosen, and do not have to get it together before we show up. The opposite may be true: We may not be able to get it together until after we show up in such miserable shape.   Continue reading →

The Long Loneliness

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By Dorothy Day 

“The only answer to this life, to the loneliness we are all bound to feel, is community. The living together, working together, sharing together, loving God and loving our brother and sister, and living close to them in community so we can show our love for God.”

Dorothy Day was an American journalist, social activist, and anarchist who started the Catholic Worker movement.

On Peace

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From Gaudium et Spes, Vatican II

“Peace is more than the absence of war, more than the maintenance of balance of power between enemies. It is more than the firm hold of a dictator that, for the moment, involves no bloodshed. But then, what is peace?

Peace is the result of justice. When society is rightly ordered, when people live as God intends, then peace reigns. Peace must be constantly built up. Human nature must be called again and again to make peace.

But even this is not sufficient. Peace comes, in the end, from love.

When we love our neighbor, even those who irritate us or alienate us, then we give peace its only chance. Unless people willingly come together to share their talents and bright minds, peace cannot be achieved.”