Prayer Cycle / Monk in the World / Day 7
Day 7: Creative Joy
Video, Audio and Written Guides for Morning and Evening Prayer
Morning Prayer
OPENING PRAYER
We rise this morning and commit ourselves to being a dancing monk and cultivating creative joy in our lives. We celebrate with St. Benedict who asked in his Rule “What is more delightful than this voice of the Holy One calling to us?” and invites us to let our hearts “overflow with the inexpressible delights of love.”
OPENING SONG
Let Our Hearts Overflow
FIRST READING: Thomas Merton
The Lord plays and diverts Himself in the garden of His creation, and if we could let go of our own obsession with what we think is the meaning of it all, we might be able to hear His call and follow Him in His mysterious, cosmic dance.
For the world and time are the dance of the Lord in emptiness. The silence of the spheres is the music of a wedding feast. . . Indeed we are in the midst of it, and it is in the midst of us, for it beats in our very blood, whether we want it to or not.
Yet the fact remains that we are invited to forget ourselves on purpose, cast our awful solemnity to the winds and join in the general dance.
SUNG PSALM OPENING
O Beauty, open my lips and my mouth will declare your praise. (Repeat)
PSALM 149
Hallelujah!
Praise God by yourself
Praise the One of many names in the congregation of the faithful.
Praise Him with song and movement
Praise Her with silence and stillness.
Praise the Unnamable in your work, in your rest,
in your love, in your anger.
Seek the Holy One in the midst of the city
and in the heart of the wilderness.
See the Beloved’s imprint in the eyes of friend and foe,
the sick and the well,
the rich and the poor,
the citizen and the stranger.
Open your heart to the One heart of love and peace.
SUNG DOXOLOGY
Glory to the Maker, Lover, and Keeper; as ago, in this breath, and will be ever. Amen, Amen.
SECOND READING: 2 Samuel 6:1-5
David again gathered all the chosen people of Israel, thirty thousand. David and all the people with him set out and went from Baale-judah, to bring up from there the ark of God, which is called by the name of the Lord of hosts who is enthroned on the cherubim. They carried the ark of God on a new cart, and brought it out of the house of Abinadab, which was on the hill. Uzzah and Ahio, the sons of Abinadab, were driving the new cart with the ark of God; and Ahio went in front of the ark. David and all the house of Israel were dancing before the Lord with all their might, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals.
SILENT CONTEMPLATION
PRAYERS OF CONCERN
We offer prayers now for all that is on our hearts.
Thank you Creator for being made in your image. Forgive us when the gift of imagination has been used to destroy instead of to build, to bring suffering and death instead of healing and life.
Sung Response – O God of Love, lead us into dancing.
Oh Spirit of inspiration, forgive us for not believing that we are all artists and poets, capable of expressing beauty and truth through creativity. Give us courage to let go of the rules and paint outside the lines.
Sung Response – O God of Love, lead us into dancing.
Help us Divine Creator to embrace our creative natures, to be purveyors of beauty in the service of the Holy. May we experience joy in the small creative acts of the everyday and discover the glory in the grey.
Sung Response – O God of Love, lead us into dancing.
Please add the prayers you are longing to express.
Sung Response – O God of Love, lead us into dancing.
CLOSING SONG
Miriam of the Dance
CLOSING BLESSING
Blessed Source of Joy
carve out room in us for the
inexpressible delights of love.
Let our hearts become fountains overflowing
into the world with your love and compassion.
Help us to pause each day and whisper “thank you”
for the most ordinary graces and gifts.
In the way that you looked upon your Creation
and called everything so good, kindle in us
that kind of generous vision.
Lift us beyond our narrow concerns and help us
to see how there is no separation, we are all connected.
Support us in honoring our bodies as sacred temples
and losing ourselves in the great cosmic dance.
SUNG AMEN
Credits
All songs and texts used with permission
Opening Prayer written by Christine Valters Paintner
Opening Song: Let Our Hearts Overflow by Richard Bruxvoort Colligan
First Reading from Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation. New York: New Directions Publishing (2007).
Sung Psalm Opening and Doxology by Richard Bruxvoort Colligan
Interpretation of Psalm 149 by Rev. Christine Robinson
Second Reading from 2 Samuel 6:1-5 (NRSV).
Prayers of Concern written by Polly Burns
Sung Response by Betsey Beckman
Closing Song: Miriam of the Dance by Betsey Beckman
Closing Blessing: written by Christine Valters Paintner
Please note: All of the Opening and Closing Songs are published on CDs in the Abbey of the Arts collection. In addition, these songs have accompanying gesture prayers and/or dances created by Betsey Beckman that can be found on the corresponding DVD (each album has a DVD companion). The Psalm Opening, Doxology, and the Response to the Prayers of Concern also have accompanying congregational gestures. The audio and video recordings of these are available at AbbeyoftheArts.com.
Evening Prayer
OPENING PRAYER
As evening comes, let us remember the moments when joy found us today. Let us celebrate the ways we danced freely and helped to create something beautiful today.
OPENING SONG
Behold, I Make All Things New
SUNG PSALM OPENING
O Beauty, open my lips and my mouth will declare your praise. (Repeat)
PSALM 96
Sing a new song to the Holy One
with all the names and none.
Proclaim our joy and thanksgiving
for creation, for life, for growth, for love.
Turn your face to the light.
rejoice in God.
Worship God in the beauty of holiness
let the whole earth tremble in awe.
Call out—
There’s this beautiful world
and all the life in it.
and there’s the rule of law in our hearts
and Love at the heart of it All.
The heavens rejoice
The earth dances
The seas roil with life
The fields are glad
The trees of the wood shout for joy.
SUNG DOXOLOGY
Glory to the Maker, Lover, and Keeper; as ago, in this breath, and will be ever. Amen, Amen.
READING OF THE NIGHT: Clarissa Pinkola Estés
I’ll tell you right now, the doors to the world of the wild Self are few but precious. If you have a deep scar, that is a door, if you have an old, old story, that is a door. If you love the sky and the water so much you almost cannot bear it, that is a door. If you yearn for a deeper life, a full life, a sane life, that is a door.
SILENT CONTEMPLATION
CLOSING POEM: Aubade
The day opens its white page,
spreading herself like so much possibility,
you take your pen, pausing
before you begin so you can hear
the jackdaw caw high above
your tiny shadow and the snowdrop’s
insistent blooming, somewhere
is the knowing glance of badger,
each unafraid to write their stories
on wind and soil and you see they
offer ink for your pen in
a hundred different colors.
CLOSING SONG
Beauty
Credits
All songs and texts used with permission
Opening Prayer written by Christine Valters Paintner
Opening Song: Behold by Alana Levandoski
Psalm Opening and Doxology by Richard Bruxvoort Colligan
Interpretation of Psalm 96 by Rev. Christine Robinson
Reading of the Night from Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves.
New York: Ballantine Books (1996).
Closing Poem by Christine Valters Paintner, The Wisdom of Wild Grace. Paraclete Press (2020).
Closing Song: Beauty by Betsey Beckman
Please note: All of the Opening and Closing Songs are published on CDs in the Abbey of the Arts collection. In addition, these songs have accompanying gesture prayers and/or dances created by Betsey Beckman that can be found on the corresponding DVD (each album has a DVD companion). The Psalm Opening and Doxology also have accompanying congregational gestures. The audio and video recordings of these are available at AbbeyoftheArts.com.
