#AdventWord #ASK - Prayers for Discernment

Today's #AdventWord is #ASK - December 9, 2015

I try to remember to ask for God's guidance along the many pathways I find in life. This past June, I found myself at Sewanee in Tennessee, walking between Stirling's Coffee House and another building. This pretty scene appeared before me and made me stop in my tracks. It hit me that we are always on a path in life, whether we know it or intend it, and whether we planned in advance for it or not. I ask God's guidance on my walk and I'm at a point now where that is a daily prayer....actually sometimes quite a few more times during some days!

                      

Yesterday, I turned in a giant application for postulancy (with supporting documents) in The Episcopal Church. Our diocesan ministry conference is in early January so I will have interviews then (with Standing Commission and Commission on Ministry) and should know more throughout the month. I feel called to walk down the path to priesthood and have been in the discernment process for the past year - and for many years if truth be told. Many turns in God's road have brought me to this place in my being and time will tell where I walk from here. I haven't written about it here, so directly, until now, but most of my friends know of my journey. I have been blessed beyond belief with God's calling and such a wonderful and uplifting discernment committee process full of growth, the support of my friends and family, amazing segue's from one thing into another that I could never have predicted, spiritual growth, my spiritual director, my vestry's nomination, and so much more.

If you're reading this, I ask you for your prayers, good wishes, and positive thoughts!

‪#‎Episcopal‬ ‪#‎Anglican‬ ‪#‎SSJE‬ ‪#‎EDOLA‬ AdventWord was created by SSJE (The Society of St. John the Evangelist) and is the Anglican Communion's Global Advent Calendar. I'm using it as a daily meditation, prayer, photo post, and a way to connect in spirit to millions during this season of light and hope. You can join me in creating your own. Just take a picture and post it with the day's AdventWord tags! Click HERE for their website and for their daily AdventWords.

#AdventWord #FORGIVE

Today's #AdventWord is #FORGIVE - December 2, 2015
I believe that just as we sometimes need to practice gratitude, we must learn to practice forgiveness. What does it mean to practice forgiveness? How can you do that? What must one experience to warrant the need for forgiveness and why on Earth would anyone create situations just to practice it? How about we use "we" as a personally connecting word, so that if we see something that concerns us, we can consider forgiveness. I don't have superb answers...these are just a few of my elementary thoughts on the words forgive and forgiveness. I have MUCH to read and learn....and practice.
What comes to my mind is the June, 2015 incident in my beloved hometown of Charleston, SC - the shooting at Emanuel A.M.E. Church. As I was driving from Charleston to Columbia to visit friends after visiting my mother, I was struck with profound sadness and tears at hearing accounts from folks all over the area calling into a local radio station. I actually had to pull over and take a few moments to cry and to listen. I cannot imagine what the victims' families were experiencing and I haven't lived in Charleston for several years, but it still greatly affected me. In discussing the shooting which had occurred the evening before, there were many tears and many angry statements. What hit me even more than this was the absolute and deeply connecting love from Charlestonians who had woven themselves together as a tapestry after hurricane Hugo in 1989. All backgrounds, all statuses, etc. coming together. This was coming across from the callers. It was an unspoken bond, yet with their support and love for Emanuel and the city itself, the bond was louder than anything else. I was so proud of my city. It would not become, as some news sources seemed to try and manufacture, a breeding ground for a racial debate or any another battle. Charleston is a unified city. I'm in a unique position having experienced this and then seeing it these past ten years here in New Orleans after Katrina. Both places, very dear to my heart, have become wells of hope for the true meaning of the word community and all the positive trappings that come with that.

The Battery Palmettos, Charleston, SC. Photo: Caroline Carson, 

Love to the victims, love to Emanuel, love of God, love for Charleston, and knowing that LOVE will save us. Later that week, I watched on TV as the victims' families publicly stated their forgiveness of the shooter. I did not even know what to make of it. I mean, HOW IN THE WORLD does one forgive so quickly?! 

The timing seemed almost as unfathomable as the shooting itself. 

Realizing that they forgave, out loud and to all, this shooter - who had infiltrated and betrayed the very heart of their church's hospitable and open environment, well.......wow. It was probably the most powerful statement of modern forgiveness that I have ever really personally felt. This forgiveness needed the first step to be a leap of blind faith. It needed to be said, regardless of whether or not it would be immediately felt. It would come. 

Forgiveness does come. It is both unnerving and comforting. Do we deserve forgiveness? I think we do and maybe we should begin with allowing ourselves to forgive, even blindly at first.

I offer this quote from C.S. Lewis "To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you."

AdventWord was created by SSJE (The Society of St. John the Evangelist) and is the Anglican Communion's Global Advent Calendar. I'm using it as a daily meditation, prayer, and a way to connect in spirit to millions during this season of light and hope. You can join me in creating your own. Just take a picture and post it with the day's AdventWord tags! Click HERE for their website and for their daily AdventWords.
#AdventWord #SSJE 

A Prayer of Thanksgiving

A Prayer of Thanksgiving

(as found in the Book of Common Prayer, The Episcopal Church)

Accept, O Lord, our thanks and praise
for all that you have done for us.
We thank you for the splendor of the whole creation,
for the beauty of this world,
for the wonder of life,
and for the mystery of love.
We thank you for the blessing of family and friends,
and for the loving care which surrounds us on every side.
We thank you for setting us at tasks
which demand our best efforts,
and for leading u to accomplishments which satisfy and delight us.
Above all, we thank you for your Son Jesus Christ;
for the truth of his Word and the example of his life;
for his steadfast obedience,
by which he overcame temptation;
for his dying,
through which he overcame death;
and for his rising to life again,
in which we are raised to the life of your kingdom.
Grant us the gift of your Spirit,
that we may know your Spirit and make your Spirit known;
and through your Spirit, at all times and in all places,
may give thanks to you in all things. Amen.

Zion Canyon, 2012 by C. Carson