book review by Doris Murphy
St. Bridget’s Parish, River Falls, Wisconsin
Boers, Arthur Paul, Barb Nelson Gingerich, Eleanor Kreider, and Mary H. Schertz, eds. Take Our Moments and Our Days: An Anabaptist Prayer Book. Co-published with the Institute of Mennonite Studies. Scottdale, Pa.; Waterloo, Ont.: Herald Press, 2005. 226 pp. ISBN: 0-8361-9334-2. Price: $10.00; in Canada $12.00.
for more information and to order go to
http://www.ambs.edu/prayerbook or
http://www.mph.org/hp/books/takeourmoments.htm
Lionel Blue wrote: “To know another religion you have to experience it, taste it, join in its prayers.” Take Our Moments and Our Days: An Anabaptist Prayer Book gave me an opportunity during Lent to experience, taste, and join in the prayer of the Anabaptist communities. This prayer book is guided by the peace, goodness, truth, and beauty reflected by that community and by the Spirit that is God. No matter one’s denominational affiliation, it is a call to prayer that can truly make anyone feel at home.
The four week cycle of morning and evening prayers for the ordinary time of the year consists of three main calls that follow the way of Christian prayer: the first call, to praise, begins with an invitation to prayer followed by a portion of a psalm, a thanksgiving, a song, and a confession; the second call, to listen, invites us as disciples to hear the voice of Jesus, offers two Scripture readings with a reflection, and is followed by the canticle of Mary or Zechariah; the third call, to respond, leads us through intercessory prayers on behalf of the person, the community, the church, and the world. The prayer closes with the Our Father and a Scripture blessing. Each prayer allows for flexibility throughout and may end with a period of common silence. The introduction to the book welcomes others to continue to make recommendations for its use.
This format, repeated week to week, is easily memorized. Many of the individual parts of the service follow common themes of the Anabaptist faith life. These are also repeated throughout the prayer cycle, thereby allowing for less concern about logistics and more freedom to move to contemplative prayer within the common prayer. The ease of movement and profound simplicity (not an oxymoron) of the three calls provide a natural rhythm of praise and thanksgiving, listening to the voice of God, and responding with prayer and petition. Because only a short portion of a psalm is selected for each day, these, too, can be quickly memorized through repetition over a short period of time. The Scripture passages are brief and carefully selected but provide sufficient verses to lead to “lectio” (reflection or mulling over the word) at a later time. The opportunity for open prayer during the intercessions makes for a progression from individual needs to the needs of the local and world communities, as the Gospel instructs.
The major themes for the four weeks – Lord’s Prayer, Beatitudes, Parables, and Miracles – are central to praying with Jesus. However, over a period of time, these themes could become routine and somewhat too programmed. The variety of carefully selected Scripture readings, can suggest additional themes for the pray-er that the Spirit of God and the very heart of the words may direct. Scripture passages always keeps prayer from becoming static. Since only portions of each psalm are selected, it is left to the pray-er to be responsible for reading the remaining verses of each psalm and exploring the riches of the psalms that are not used.
The preface, introduction, and notes, lay out a careful framework for the what, why, and how of this community prayer. For the Anabaptist community, restoring this prayer for their church use has been a serious project for over 25 years. An adequate introduction is provided to explain the meaning of and reasons for this prayer style. This is especially helpful for those in the Anabaptist community who have not officially been involved in formal communal prayer, as well as for non-church members who may wish to use the book for personal or public prayer. The introduction could be enriched with a reference to Acts 2:42 where we first read that the Christian community gathered for common prayer. Since the founding of the early Christian church, an essential element of religious life has been prayer in common – as it had been in the Jewish home before that. This prayer book continues that custom in a comfortable way, keeping with a less ritualistic style of prayer.
The Rule of St. Benedict from the 5th century remains the premier source for prayer in common. The motto for the monks was and is “ora et labora” – “work and pray.” The introduction to this book acknowledges that if only our work is our prayer, then, perhaps, we are not praying! We need to set aside time to focus without distraction on this “opus dei” – “work of God.” The term “Liturgy of the Hours” has been used for centuries to designate the prayer of the Christian community. Time during certain hours each day were and are set aside to give praise and thanks to God. It is fitting, then, that this new prayer book, a very user-friendly book of prayer, aptly used a hymn reference for the title. It opens us to regular prayer with a welcome title: “Take our moments and our days.”