The Church MLK

The Church
“The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority. If the church does not participate actively in the struggle for peace and for economic and racial justice, it will forfeit the loyalty of millions and cause men everywhere to say that it has atrophied its will. But if the church will free itself from the shackles of a deadening status quo, and, recovering its great historic mission, will speak and act fearlessly and insistently in terms of justice and peace, it will enkindle the imagination of mankind and fire the souls of men, imbuing them with a glowing and ardent love for truth, justice, and peace. Men far and near will know the church as a great fellowship of love that provides light and bread for lonely travelers at midnight.”
Martin Luther King Jr., "A Knock at Midnight”, 11 June 1967.

 a church with its lights on... Gigi Cottrell

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr has been a part of my life since his death on April 4, 1968.  He died the day before my birthday in Memphis where I was a senior medical student. At the time the only thing I could concentrate on was finishing medical school, but his death in the city where I was struggling to find myself and my career made me turn my head and look outside of my own small isolated world. Many others were changed as well. In the next few days the dean of the cathedral where I worshiped, William Dimmick, took the processional cross from St. Mary’s Cathedral and led a march down Popular Avenue to the Mayor’s office to try to stop the violence and the sanitation worker’s strike that had brought King to Memphis. He lost half of his congregation because of his bravery.

King is writing to remind us that the church is not the voice of the status quo. Certainly that was not Jesus’ message as well. So many people come for spiritual direction because they disagree with what is going on in their church and they are leaving it. I see King’s message is just not to the church but to its members. If we see what is wrong in our church, that the church is only serving itself and the wealthy and not working for justice and peace for all, we must try not to leave it if possible. The church we grew up in or the church we have come to love will only make changes when the people within it like us move for change. Our leaving it will not make a difference. Of course, there are times when the air in the church has become too toxic, and we must leave it for the sake of our soul. But if we can, we must work to change it and speak up to remind the church of Jesus’ and King’s message, to “provide light and bread for lonely travelers at midnight.”

Joanna    joannaseibert.com  

Spiritual Direction vs Therapy

Difference between therapy and spiritual direction

"Converted anxiety is hope. Anxiety is dreadful expectation; hope is expectant desire. They are like cousins to each other. Pray for the conversion of your fretful anxiety into promising hope. If you are anxious just now, you are almost already hopeful."

Br. Curtis Almquist, Society of Saint John the Evangelist daily EmailSSJE

There is sometimes confusion between the ministries of a therapist and a spiritual director. We learn early in spiritual direction training that a therapist helps people deal with life on life’s terms. A spiritual director is a caretaker of the soul, one’s connection to God. Sometimes helping people realize their connection to God can help them deal with life on life’s terms, and often learning to live with life can reconnect us to God, but it can be very different. Becoming the person God created us to be, living a connected life can sometimes make life even more difficult, more challenging. A spiritual director will listen to what is going on in a person’s life, but he or she is looking for the God connection at every pause. A therapist will be looking at every pause for ways to lead the person to find a solution or way to deal with the pain they are knowing. A spiritual director focuses on one thing, seeing God at work in that person’s life.  My favorite part of being a pediatric radiologist was caring for babies. When I meet with someone, I like to image their soul as a newborn they have offered over to me for a brief time to be cared for and nurtured and then gently returned to them wrapped in a warm blanket and resting and smiling at peace as they leave.

Joanna           joannaseibert.com

centering prayer again

Centering prayer again

Guidelines

“1. Choose a sacred word as the symbol of your intention to consent to God’s presence and action within.

2. Sitting comfortably and with eyes closed, settle briefly and silently introduce the sacred word as the symbol of your consent to God’s presence and action within.

3. When engaged with your thoughts, feelings, images, and reflections, return ever-so-gently to the sacred word.

4. At the end of the prayer period (20 minutes), remain in silence with eyes closed for a couple of minutes.”

Contemplative outreach, Ltd., www.contemplativeoutreach.org .

 Reviewing and remembering the guidelines for Centering Prayer are worth repeating. This contemporary form of the ancient practice of contemplative or listening prayer has been written about by Catholic monks Thomas Merton, Thomas Keating, Basil Pennington and Quaker Richard Foster. It is drawn from ancient prayer practices of the Desert Mothers and Fathers, The Cloud of the Unknowing, Teresa of Avila, and St. John of the Cross. A friend from New York, Steve Standiford who is associated with Contemplative Outreach and has practiced centering prayer for over twenty years, reminded us at a retreat at our church of an old story about how to deepen our relationship with God and experience God’s presence and love in our lives through centering prayer. “A first-time tourist to New York City gets into the cab and asks the driver, ‘How do you get to Carnegie Hall?’ The driver responds, ‘Practice, practice, practice!’”  

Joanna          joannaseibert.com