Archive for the ‘Prayer’ Category
Sunday, May 16th, 2010
Religious freedom under assault:
The Peralta Community College District has settled a federal lawsuit over its punishment of two College of Alameda students who were praying on campus. The four-college district will pay $90,000 in legal fees to students Kandy Kyriacou and Ojoma Omaga, who were threatened with suspension after they prayed in class and after Kyriacou prayed with a sick instructor in the teacher’s office….
Public agencies and schools are supposed to remain neutral when it comes to religion, said UC Berkeley law professor Rachel Moran, who is a visiting professor at UC Irvine this year. However, it remains unclear whether that means public schools should be more or less restrictive about allowing prayer on campus, she said.
[From Peralta settles lawsuit over student prayer - San Jose Mercury News]
Speak Up reports that the basis for the students’ suspension had been that they violated policy against
Disruptive or insulting behavior, willful disobedience, habitual profanity or vulgarity, or the open and persistent defiance of the authority of, refusal to comply with directions of, or persistent abuse of, college employees in the performance of their duty . . . .
This was (apparently) the form in which they practiced their “disruption, insulting, willful disobedience, habitual profanity or vulgarity, defiance of authority, and or persistent abuse:”
According to court documents, the students prayed with each other outside of class during class breaks, prayed silently to themselves in class, and on one occasion, engaged in a consensual and student-initiated prayer with an ill faculty member in her office.
More from the court documents:
The events giving rise to this dispute began on November 1, 2007. Kyriacou went to the office of her instructor, Sharon Bell, to discuss matters related to her class. (Bell shared this office with other instructors.) Eventually, their conversation turned to personal matters, and Kyriacou prayed with Bell after obtaining her consent. On December 12, 2007, Kyriacou again went to Bell’s shared office – this time to give her a Christmas gift. Upon learning that Bell was sick, Kyriacou said that she was sorry and offered to pray for Bell. When Bell bowed her head, Kyriacou began praying for her to get well.
While Kyriacou was praying for Bell, defendant Derek Piazza, another instructor, entered the office. Piazza interrupted the prayer, saying, “You can’t be doing that in here!” and Kyriacou ceased praying and left the office. Kyriacou then saw Omaga in the hall and was explaining to her what had happened when Piazza reappeared and said, “You can’t be doing that in there! That’s our office.” Omaga had not been in the office with Kyriacou and Bell, nor did she overhear the initial exchange with Piazza.
On December 22, 2007, both Kyriacou and Omaga received letters from defendant Kerry Compton, the Vice President of Student Services at the College. The letters notified plaintiffs of the College’s intent to suspend them from class, effective December 10, 2007.
Speak Up closes its article on the case,
But what is telling here is how far the College was willing to go to resist clearly protected speech and the reasons for its resistance. Engaging in a year and a half of litigation is not the reaction of a university welcoming of its students’ religious freedoms. Instead, its actions reveal a deep, unsettling hostility to religion that is all too prevalent at America’s institutions of higher education.
The court made the right decision. And yet there is still that chilling question raised by Rachel Moran:
It remains unclear whether that means public schools [note: the context is colleges, not primary or secondary schools] should be more or less restrictive about allowing prayer on campus.
What’s unclear about it?
Thursday, April 15th, 2010
The National Day of Prayer, honored in the United States for more than a half-century, is unconstitutional, a federal judge in Wisconsin has ruled.
[From Judge: Natl Day Of Prayer Unconstitutional]
The National Day of Prayer has been observed on the first Thursday in May since 1988 (other days before that). I’m not going to rush to a written opinion on what the judge ruled. I don’t agree with it, but I’m not in a position right now to analyze it.
Instead I want to raise a call to make her decision irrelevant. Christians, will you commit to fast that day, whether one meal or all three? Will you commit to at least one half-hour of prayer for our country that day? Will you commit to making May 6, 2010, the most significant American National Day of Prayer in our generation?
Tuesday, December 29th, 2009
An atheist who goes by the nom de blog “ylooshi” raised this question about my pre-Christmas post on Wishing and Celebrating:
Then it occurred to be, even before I left the paragraph above, that if you replace “wish” for “prayer,” you really haven’t changed the criticism….
The author both criticizes ineffectual wishing the world was different and then appeals to an ineffectual superstition to make the world different. The kettle has thus referred to the pot as blacker than he. Perhaps “Christian” in the blog title was an adjective and not a noun after all.
My “wish” for the holidays: that more people begin to think and rise above superstition. But we cannot just wish for this sort of thing. We must make efforts to spread inquiry and rational thought; reach out to those around us -inspire them to think and engage them in discussion and debate, and, where appropriate, push them into both.
His posted was titled “Coffee pots, kettles, and several shades of black.” There’s a neat play on words there (the whole thing started with something I had found written on a Starbucks coffee cup). I wish I could write headlines that well. I posted a comment in response, or tried to, but today I see it never showed up there. That happens sometimes.
So is there a real difference between Christian prayer and ineffectual wishing? I think every Christian wonders about that sometimes—even Christians who blog about reasons to believe. Even Christian leaders.
A while ago I was having lunch with a small group of Christian leaders at a conference. One of them was an author and speaker with a worldwide reputation; he is a leader in his field of study. Many of you who read this have read his books or heard him speak. Another was a somewhat recent convert from another religion. This second person was telling us the story of how he decided to follow Jesus Christ. He was (as he told us) being led toward belief through the lifestyle and the persuasive arguments of a close friend, but the distance from his former religion to Christianity was great. He asked the Lord for a vision to confirm the reality of Christ, and he was granted one. In spite of that he wasn’t ready yet, so he asked for a dream as additional confirmation. Very soon he experienced a dream that other members of his religion (quite unintentionally, on their part) interpreted in a way that clearly pointed toward Christianity.
That still wasn’t sufficient for him, though, so he asked for another dream, and the same happened: he had a dream that he shared with other members of his religion, and again they (not he) gave an interpretation that was clearly Christian. And even that wasn’t enough for him. He asked God for one more.
At this point in his story the other listener in the group, the world-renowned author and speaker, slapped his knee and laughed, and said, “I can’t even get a prayer answered, and there you go asking for a fourth sign from God!”
The fourth sign did come, and that convert from another religion has become a very bold witness for Christ. But it was striking to hear a prominent Christian leader say, “I can’t even get a prayer answered.” No, that was not an absolute statement; he was joking with us when he said it. Still I think every Christian has sometimes wondered whether his or her prayers were anything more than wishes. The Psalmists asked repeatedly, “How long, O Lord?” Unanswered prayers are no deep dark secret in Christianity: even the Bible’s authors asked hard questions about prayer. They show up all over the Bible’s main prayer book, the Psalms.
Several months ago I began keeping a prayer journal on my computer. Some of my prayers are what I call “ongoing,” which would include things like health, family members’ spiritual and character development, and other important yet non-specific matters of that sort. They are the sort of prayers for which quick and distinct answers are not expected. Some, on the other hand, are quite specific requests. Many of them have by now come to a conclusion such that I can tell how the prayer came out. I’ve recorded a total of 89 with a “yes” answer, and 13 that didn’t turn out the way I had prayed they would. I certainly would not say that “I can’t even get a prayer answered.” I’m sure the other leader I mentioned above wouldn’t say that either, if he were speaking in a more serious context.
And yet I keep waiting for God to answer other prayers: prayers for specific financial needs, prayers for a magazine to accept an article I’ve submitted, prayers for people to follow Jesus Christ, and much more. Every new prayer is a new test, in a way: Will God really act? Or are these prayers anything more than pious wishing?
That all depends on one question: Is there a God who answers prayer? (I also wrote something to that effect last time.) If not, then ylooshi is right: prayer really is just rationalized wishing. If there is a prayer-answering God, though, then at least some God-directed desires are considerably more than wishes. There could still be misdirected, false prayers based on pure selfishness or misapprehensions of God’s will, but there can also be real prayers that really get answered by the real God.
The Psalmists believed the prayer-answering God really existed. Still they asked “How long, O Lord?” I ask the same question about my unanswered prayers, and yet I remain convinced that God is and that he answers prayer in his time and according to his good wisdom.
The Psalms were not written as apologetical treatises, and (in case it has escaped notice) neither is this blog post. (This might be confusing for readers who are accustomed to me writing on reasons for belief.) This post is less about “why believe;” and more about “what it’s like to believe.” Could I mount a reasoned defense for God’s existence in spite of unanswered prayer? I think so. My apologies must go, however, to those who would like me to do that, so that they could argue against it. I have decided not to do that in this post. Apologetics is not my only purpose as a blogger and a Christian. Sometimes I fear that by focusing on it so much here, I’m falsely communicating that it’s all there is to belief or to a relationship with God.
This is what it’s like to believe: it means to be confident of much and yet to remain unsure of much. It is to know that God is real and that living in relationship with him through Jesus Christ is the greatest thing in the world. Yet it is also to wonder, frequently, what God’s purposes are. It is to be sure that prayer prayed according to the will of God will be answered, and yet to spend much time puzzling over his will for specific matters. It is to be constantly aware that God is in control, which means that I’m not, and neither are my prayers.
One thing is certain: the Christian faith is a lot more sound and secure with some prayers going unanswered. Apart from putting us as usurpers in the place of God in the world, and besides the obvious absurdities (no sports team would ever lose a game), getting every answer we want would also undermine God’s relational purposes for us. If all we had to do was toss a thought skyward and get what we wanted, why then, that’s all we would do. Instead, however, we find we must persevere in prayer. Many speak of “wrestling with God,” or “agonizing in prayer:” struggling through questions and enigmas, searching out God’s guidance over long periods, pursuing difficult answers in the midst of much mystery. “Answers” to hard, earnest prayer like this, in whatever form they come, are often incidental to its main effect in us: deeper intimacy with God and knowledge of him.
And this is the final answer to ylooshi’s question. Is praying any different than wishing? Yes, real prayer is very different; for the one who really prays in Christ knows that it’s not just about getting what we want. It’s about growing up in the deep knowledge and infinite love of God. You can’t just wish for that.
Sunday, October 11th, 2009
In response to this comment and those preceding:
I am sure there is much manipulative prayer prayed by Christians. I am equally certain there is no truly Christian manipulative prayer. The difference is in “Not my will but thine be done.” Prayer is as much a searching for God’s perfect, good, and wise will as it is asking for things; and to ask while so searching, in submission to God, is not to manipulate anything or anyone.
Tuesday, April 7th, 2009
You wouldn’t expect a talk on Jesus and the University to start in Calcutta, India, but that’s the context in which Mary Poplin presented her thoughts on this topic. Poplin was at one time Dean of the School of Educational Studies at Claremont Graduate University in southern California, and continues today working on social justice issues related to education. She took a lengthy sabbatical in Calcutta to work with Mother Teresa there, and relays part of that story in this talk. How does that tie in to the university? I’ll let you discover that for yourself. I think you’ll find it well worthwhile.
What especially caught my attention in this message was how well it illustrates four strategic principles I’ve been emphasizing for deep social change:
- Discover God afresh
- Call on him through extraordinary prayer
- Expand our acts of sacrificial love
- Increase our intellectual engagement
Apparently she also gave a followup talk, which I just discovered while writing this blog post (iTunes didn’t pick it up for some reason). Here too is a lengthy list of other talks she has given.
P.S. If you haven’t subscribed to the Veritas Media podcast yet, what are you waiting for?
Sunday, March 15th, 2009
Four Strategies for Christians In a Changing World
A talk given this morning at the Chapel at Kingsmill, Williamsburg, VA.
Sometimes the culture wars are about specific topics in dispute: defense of marriage, sanctity of life, what’s portrayed in the media, and so on. For Christians, there’s also another, completely different front in the battle: experiencing God and living his life to its deepest, and demonstrating that life in its full attractiveness to the rest of the world.
Click To Play:
Or Download Here
Links to articles mentioned in the talk:
The Coming Evangelical Collapse
Christianity Today’s Response
Deep Social Change
At about 26 minutes I communicated visually in such a way that, with audio only, it’s hard to guess what I meant by the word “this” at that point. It was a reference to God’s Word, the Bible.
Wednesday, February 18th, 2009
Christ Otto, the founder of the Red Envelope Project , sent me this email today:
As I was praying this morning, I had the sense that these envelopes were one way the God wants to reinvigorate a nationwide prayer movement. I have begun asking people to pray the “life prayer” while they send their envelopes. Would you mind putting that on your blog?
Here is the prayer:
Jesus, I plead your blood over my sin, and the sin of my nation. God end abortion and send revival to America.
Thanks.
This is particularly an encouragement directed toward Christian readers of the blog; there is theology contained in it that may not make immediate sense to others. (It might be a great topic for me to blog on someday but not right now.)
|
|
