My Book of Uncommon Prayers: My Easter Prayer

St. Andrew’s Abbey ’11

Is it just another day, another ritual performed,

a chance to wear new clothes and serve festive meals,

a celebration to mark our days and orient ourselves in a new year?

Is it just another obligation,

a compartment to fit in all the praiseworthy things

we ought to feel,

hope to feel,

about One so distant, so long ascended?

Has the burning in our hearts been quenched by familiar practices

and institutions?

Has the finger-in-the-side-faith lost its exclamations,

replaced by programs, distractions, and holy soundtracks?

Has our communion in the garden become commonplace

rather than ablaze with revelation and intimacy?

Oh, God of the resurrection,

God of the unruly and easily sidetracked,

burn within my heart this day.

Renew this shabby faith, these tattered shreds of almost belief,

with an obsession,

a knowing,

a persistence,

and an urgency to love You,

to love the faltering, the lost.

To be the Kingdom person you suffered to make me

is my Easter prayer.

St. Andrew’s Abbey ’11