Friday, May 23, 2008

I could be an Anglican!

My friend Andy who has written a great book called Punk Monk gave me a very helpful book called The Daily Office of the Society of Saint Francis. It's basically a book of guided prayer. It has psalms, hymns, prayers and stuff like that in it. The best bit is the daily prayers and collects, morning, midday, evening and night. They are set prayers and readings with space for your own petitions and intercessions, I really enjoy using it, I trying to do at least one everyday, I find the night prayers especially helpful. Sometimes it's nice to be guided.

In many ways I enjoy the whole anglican side of church, it's not something I was particularly exposed to until we came to Ibiza. We try to attend the local English speaking Anglican church every other week, It's not lively and charismatic but the words within the service carry such depth. If you can still your mind and zone into the words it can be a very meaningful experience. I also find all the religious statues and windows in the church very helpful, I'm a visual person.

The Thursday night blessing from The Daily office SSF

In peace, we will lie down and sleep;
For you alone, Lord, make us dwell in safety.

Abide with us, Lord Jesus
For the night is at hand and the day has now past.

As the night watch looks for the morning,
So do we look for you, O Christ

Come with the dawning of the day
And make yourself known in the breaking of the bread.

May God,s love surround us,
God's joy fill our lives,
God's peace be in our hearts,
and God's blessing be with us
this night and always.
Amen.

2 comments:

Mimosa said...

That's a nice one. Yeah I believe it's nice to be guided sometimes too. Blessings to Ibiza&yous!

dave wiggins said...

aye, its sometimes nice, the whole lithurgy stuff. i'm partly anglican now.