As Anglicans, we have been taught about the power of prayer in the Kingdom of God. But do we realize such prayer should focus on fellow Christians, and especially on those who are persecuted for their faith? It’s sobering, but also joyful, to learn about the persecuted church around the world. At the Anglican Persecuted…
46 Theses on Lectio Divina
There are many excellent books on Lectio Divina, the sacred reading of Scripture. The problem with these books is that they are books—long and easily divorced from the actual contemplative practice. Instead, I offer a list of 46 “theses” or “chapters” on Lectio Divina. Each thesis is short, distilling thoughts and quotations into a single…
What is Lectio Divina?
How do we read Scripture? What happens when we sit down with our Bibles and begin to pore over the wisdom God has given us through its ancient authors? In our rationalistic world, we often find it easy to study the Bible but not as easy to meditate upon and absorb it. We’re tempted to…
What is the Anglican Rosary?
For over a thousand years, people of faith have used various methods to keep track of their prayers. The Rosary actually finds its roots in the British Isles. The first Christians to use beads with their prayers were in the Irish community of St. Colomba in the ninth century. Though the practice of using stones…
Stepping into Silence
Stepping into a rhythm of silence is counterintuitive to everything we practice in our society, but it has many gifts to impart.
A Rule of Life: What It Is and How to Make One
What is a Rule of Life? Monks living in community live by a common Rule. Benedictine monks, for instance, live by the Rule of St. Benedict. The Rule governs every element of a monk’s life: when they sleep, work, pray, and eat, as well as how they work out community issues, etc. Oblates of monasteries—lay…
Ancient Words in a Crisis of Faith
The pandemic was lonely, scary, and anxiety-inducing for many people the world over. For me, it was even worse because I felt like the bottom fell out of my life, and the pandemic was the icing on the cake. In 2018, I had finished grad school and moved back in with my parents to start…
Chasing After Earnest Confession
Years ago, after an evening of moral failure, I attempted to reconcile with God while on a run, wrestling with whether I meant my recitation of the common confession. A Run with the Confession I woke up with a moral hangover. I tried to fall back asleep to avoid the guilt and shame swirling in my…
A Daily Examen
The Daily Examen is pretty straightforward: Somewhere towards the end of the day, take 10 minutes and prayerfully look back on what you did and thought, and bring your day into the light of Christ. Traditionally, the two categories of investigation are “consolations” and “desolations”—inner spiritual experiences that accompanied the acts of the day—that can…
A Self-Examination of Sin with the 10 Commandments
Try to be as practical as possible in making your list of sins in preparation for confession. Think concretely. Think about what several sins may have been involved in a single act. Be sure to distinguish proclivities and temptations to sin from actual acts of sin (acts that may be mental or physical). If there is ambiguity, feel free…
