Halloween

Whenever 

I am afraid,

I put my trust 

in you. 

In God 

whose word

I praise, 

in God 

I trust 

and will not

be afraid. 

                                       Psalm 56:3-4a

Sunday Evening Prayer

When I consider the work of  your fingers, the moon and the stars you have set in 

their courses,

What is man that you should be mindful of him?

he son of man that you should seek him out? Psalm 8:4-5

Sunday

The 

Lord 

will 

give 

strength

to 

his 

people; 

the 

Lord

will 

give

his 

people 

the 

blessing 

of peace.    Psalm 29:11

Saturday EP

When 

I called 

you 

answered

me; 

you 

increased 

my strength within me. Psalm 18:4

Saturday morning

Cast your burden upon 

the Lord and 

he will sustain you. Psalm 55:24

Friday Evening Prayer

 Let both wheat and weeds grow to-
gether until the harvest.... Matthew 13:30

The Feast of Saint Simon and St Jude

I waited patiently 

for the Lord; 

he stopped to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the desolate pit, out of the mire and clay; he set my feet upon a high cliff 

and made my footing sure. 

Psalm 40:1-2

Thursday before the Eucharist

We bless you for our creation, preservation and all the blessings of this life, but above all for the immeasurable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace & for the hope of glory. 

The General Thanksgiving at Morning Prayer 

Wednesday

         grant that amid all the cares and occupations 

of our life we may not forget You 

collect for guidance 

Tuesday Evening Prayer #2

Be 

our 

light 

in 

the 

darkness, 

O 

Lord 

Collect Against Perils 

at Evening Prayer 

tuesday Evening Prayer

Come now and look upon the works of the Lord, 

what awesome things he has done 

on earth. Psalm 46:10

Tuesday

Worship 
the Lord 

in the beauty 

of  holiness; 

Come, let us 

adore him. 

                                   Antiphon on the Venite

Monday

Surely it is God who saves me,

I will trust in him and not be afraid, for the Lord is my stronghold and my sure defense, and he will

be my savior. Canticle 9

Sunday

O 

God, 

you 

are 

my 

God;

eagerly 

I 

seek 

you

Psalm 63:1

Saturday

      In returning 

      and rest 

      we shall 

      be saved, 

     in quietness 

     and trust 

     shall be 

     our strength. 

     Isaiah 30:15

Another Friday

    

       
           Be 

          strong 

          and 

          let 

          your 

          heart 

          take 

          courage, 

          all you who wait for the Lord. Psalm 31:24

Thursday

Commit 

your 

way 

to the 

Lord 

and 

put 

your 

trust

in him. 

Psalm 37:5  

The wonderful graphic was Just sent to me by Debby Park who took it recently at the Albuquerque Balloon Festival, and just sent them to me Tuesday - and it's Perfect! for today - and today's challenges. I'd "gotten" the verse and then was thinking of a path or stairs or... and then I remmbered this! 

Wednesday

      Lord

      God, 

      you 

      have 

      brought 

      us 

      to 

      this 

      new 

      day, 

      preserve 

      us

      with 

      your

      mighty

      power.... 

      

                             Collect for Grace, Morning Prayer

The Feast of St Luke, Apostle and Evangelist

Lord, 

I love the house in which you dwell,

and the place where your glory abides.

                       Psalm 26:8

I love this verse because it changes so from time to time - sometimes “the house in which you dwell” is a church or an altar, or a single man, Jesus. In Advent it’s Mary’s womb or, at Christmas, the stable at Bethlehem,. The “place where your glory abides” is as small as right here, this rocking chair that was Ruth Neary’s, where I sit to pray, or the sunrise, unseen today because of  fog,  or “the vast expanse  of interstellar space.” Or an atom or a flower. Or my pregnant friend.  Where does Gods glory not abide?  Today my graphic will be recognized by many of you as the chapel at St Mary’s, Santa Barbara. My Mom used to go there on retreat when I was little.  Now the retreat house of the Order of the Holy Cross who used to be up the hill,  it was run by the Sisters of the Holy Nativity when Mom went there and when I first went there in the mid 60s and has always been a place where God’s glory abides. 

Who said you should pray with the newspaper in one hand and the Scriptures in the other?

the

needy 

shall 

not 

always

be 

forgotten, and the hope of the 

poor shall not perish forever. Psalm 9:18

St Ignatius of Antioch in Syria, bishop, martyred for his faith in the year 119....

The sorrows of 

my heart have increased;  bring me out of my troubles. Let integrity and uprightness 

preserve me, for my hope 

has been in you.

Ps. 25:16, 20

Sunday

                                       Psalm 148:4a-5b

   Praise him, heaven of heavens, for
He commanded and they were created                                   

Saturday evening

Turn again to your rest, 

O my soul, for the Lord has treated you well.  Psalm 46:6

St Teresa of Avila, 16h c. nun and mystic, "Doctor of the church" founder of the DIscalced Carmelites. At her death she said "Oh my Lord! Now is the time when we may see each other."

Some 

put 

their 

trust

in 

chariots 

and 

some 

in 

horses, 

but 

we 

will 

call 

upon 

the Name of the Lord our God.

These statues dominated Budapest during its Soviet days After they obtained their freedom, not so long ago, instead of destroying them, they were moved out of town into a statue park.          

Friday again

Because

the Lord 

is at my 

right hand 

I shall not fall.

My heart,

therefore,

is glad, 

and my 

spirit 

rejoices;

my body also 

shall rest in hope.  Psalm 16: 8-9 

As I'm actually ready to go in and DO my meditation, it strikes me that if/when my heart is glad and my spirit rejoices and my body is not in knots and all cranked up, it is EVIDENCE that I am working a third step/ turning my life and my will over to the care of God ....  

Thursday

stay 

with 

us 

for 

evening

is at 

hand 

and 

the day is past; be our companion on the way, kindle our hearts and awaken hope that we may know you... 

Evening Prayer Collect for the Presence of Christ

Thursday

I 

love 

you, 

O 

Lord, 

my 

strength

Psalm 18:1   A column in the church on Iona 

`

Blessed be the Lord,

the God of Israel, for he has come to his people and set them free. Benedictus 

Herbon, where Abraham settled., as it was in 1839. Lithograph by David Roberts. 

Abraham had been promised that he would be "the father of many nations - as many as the sands on the seashore." Only problem was that Sarah hadn't been able to get pregnant and by now she was well beyond child bearing years and there was no child.  God had obviously either forgotten or screwed up, so they took matters into their own hands, so to speak, and Abram (they were still Abram and Sarai at this point) impregnated Hagar, Sarah’s Egyptian slave, so at least legally he would have an heir.   It was then that the 3 unknown guests appeared  and said they that the next year when they came Sarah would have a child....   "And Sarah laughed." Small wonder!  But sure enough, Sarah did conceive and bear Isaac, their beloved son. 
“Lord God of our Fathers; God of Abraham (oops - and Sarah, don’t forget Sarah!) and Isaac and Jacob, God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; open our eyes to your hand in the world about us.” (Eucharistic Prayer C) And help us to remember that what you promise you will fulfill a and that you don’t need our help! 

Please pray for Oliver who is 3 and is undergoing treatment for cancer

Surely you behold trouble and misery; you see it and take it into your hand.      Psalm 10:14

Full moon Tuesday

But as for me, 

through the greatness of your mercy 

I will go into your house; I will bow 

down toward our holy temple in awe of you. 

                After doing the blog, I went in to actually do my mediation. I always write the quote, on a piece of paper so I have the exact words in front of me to help me keep my focus - or bring the focus back! And back. And back!  And afterward I put in my pocket so I have it throughout the the day.  I started writing without looking and I wrote “But as for me, I go into your house...”  Nope. the words are "As for me, through the greatness of your mercy, I go in... See why I write the words down?  Now I have a place to begin- not with my entering, but with God’s  initiative.... Neat stuff! 

Columbus Day Celebrated

Love 

never 

ends. 

I Corinthians, 13:8

Sunday Evening Prayer

From the rising 

of the sun 

to its going down 

let the Name

of the 

Lord be praised.    Psalm 113:3

A Fall Sunday in San Diego, 2011

Happy 

are 

they 

who 

have 

the 

God 

of 

Jacob

for 

their 

help! 

whose 

hope 

is in 

the 

Lord 

their 

God. 

Psalm 146:4

A Fall Sunday in Ely, 1999

I’m so grateful to have “the God of Jacob” for our help. Often I pass over it as a pious bit of fluff and forget the real history, the actual history. Our knowledge of God does not begin with Jesus, it merely continues the relationship with His Chosen ones., pointing always to the Father.  Jacob, remember, was the one, with his mother’s help, who stole his brother’s birthright for a bowl of lentils.  And when the day of reckoning finally came and Jacob was on his way to meet his bother, he was so uncertain about the outcome that he left half his stuff on the other side of the river so everything wouldn’t get taken! Our hope is in the Lord our God not because of dogma but because of a saving experience that repeats and repeats. 

Will Rogers said “Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.”  “ Give us such grace through our worship of you that he week to come may be spent in your favor.”  that “your grace may always precede and follow us”  (Collect for Sundays and The Collect of the day) 

Saturday Evening Prayer

Yonder is the great and wide sea 

with its creatures too many to number, creatures both great and small. There move the ships and there is that Leviathan which you have 
made just for the fun of it.
Psalm 104:26-27

Saturday

If 

I have 

not 

love 

I am 

nothing. 

I Corinthians 13:2

Friday morning

my word will not return 

to me empty, but 

I will accomplish that which I have purposed and 

prosper in that for which I sent it. 

Canticle 10
This is kind of the crown of all the readings today.  At first I thought my verse might be in Psalm 142 “When my spirit languishes within me, you know my path.” But it wasn’t clear that it was, so I read on. I Kings continued to set the stage, listing endless kings, most of whom “did worse than their ancestors.” I often wonder why in the World we are reading this stuff but this year it makes sense, what with our own bleak landscape, the polarization, the paralysis, the ever widening gap between rich (and I mean RICH) and poor. Such is our common life (and our individual life) without God. Today the king destroys the golden vessels in the temple that King Solomon had made. “When my spirit languished with me...” indeed!  The first Morning Prayer canticle spoke the good news to me: "I will accomplish that which I have purposed.....”  So I used that on the blog, and went with the graphic which I was given.  But then in I Corinthians 12 I read the “we who are many are one body” and knew that was the fulfillment of the verse.... Whatever things look like  in our personal or national  or international life, God knows our path, God  will accomplish what HE has purposed which is the reconciliation of all things In HIM. I love the graphic, with all those individual gorgeous individual parts of the agapantha-to- be all squeezed in together! God will accomplish what He has purposed and we can get in the way or out of the way, but Gods word will not return to Him empty.                                                                                                               

Thursday Evening Prayer

Lord Jesus, stay 

with 

us for evening is at hand and the day is past; be our companion on the way, kindle our hearts and awaken hope...                             Collect for the Presence of Christ.

     Type font is Apple Chancery for Steve Jobs... 

A typical early Thursday morning...

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit 
for the common good... 

                         to each is given not A manifestation 
                         but THE manifestation of the Spirit