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Forgiveness, My Need for Confession and The Church!
Forgiveness
“Ho’oponopono” an Hawaiian healing practice of reconcilliation and forgiveness. https://youtu.be/2psxMTlFvlA
meaning – I LOVE YOU, PLEASE FORGIVE ME, I’M SORRY, THANK YOU – said simply in any combination it’s a powerful mini meditation.
When I read the following extended version in Joe Vitale’s book Zero Limits, I was able to see the similarity with the ‘confession’ in church.
“Sorry, Please Forgive me for all the thoughts & memories that are holding me back at this moment in time. I Love You, Thank You”
Seeing the words ‘all the thoughts and memories‘ for me, refer to all the drama that we get involved in this life, which from my spiritual study I believe have all been necessary to bring us/me to this moment, to ask for forgiveness and helped me to realise that they – ‘the thoughts and memories’ do ‘hold me back at this moment in time’ from acknowledging & connecting with Love to the Universe in it’s glory.
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Also see the NDW’s story of Little Soul to see why ‘forgiveness‘ is necessary which is proven so perfectly in the TED Talk of Colleen and Harvey https://youtu.be/FE7TaUG3qQI where Colleen epitomizes the words of Eckhart Tolle quoting the biblical words “ ‘peace that passeth all understanding‘ happens when we accept that which we didn’t want and drop the resistance to accept what is.”
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see My Story, Part VI & VII and Inspirational Books 2011 –
my need for confession
From my journal written at the Dominican Sisters Priory on Tuesday 5th April 2011
“I felt within, at the 7 am morning prayer that God was asking me to go deeper. Perhaps even to make a new start – to clear the old – I started to contemplate what I would confess.
- I confess that I have never confessed – this is my first ever confession.
- So I ask for forgiveness for all the many sins I must have done before, known and unknown.
- I have learnt much along the way & am aware of when I transgress & attempt not to repeat until the new learnt positive behaviour becomes my norm. What things do I know I still do? – not so much sin but behaviour that still has to be improved so that I may become more Christ like.
- I know at times I do not have enough patience & understanding with my fellow man when they are unwell.. Guide me Lord, help me to have the wisdom & know when to use the right words as a means of support & when to be silent.
- Let me not think I know what God wants – help me to handover & let go to do his will. Thy will be done.
- Forgive me for any arrogance I may have over others – once again thinking that I know what they need – help me to ‘let go’ and ‘let God’.
- So let me ponder these words, help me God.
- Reading through these words my sense of ‘I’ is still pretty, imposing, grand, important, – Help me Lord, Let me have more humility.
- I ask for forgiveness in thinking that I am closer to God than I really am – I ask that this gap may be closed, that I can deepen my connection with God. the following prayer was my conclusion:=
‘Dear Lord, I realise my biggest sin has been in thinking that I hadn’t sinned. I had not realised the true meaning of sin – even now I couldn’t define it – but I know I have understood and now I can begin to ask for forgiveness and I can begin to repent. – “repentence without ceasing.” I can’t believe I am writing these words – but I know that they are the truth & I ask you dear Lord Jesus to forgive me.’
and so wonderful that 5 years later I was back again at the Priory and was able to see that I could UNSUBSCRIBE from my membership to the Catholic church without losing my connection to God.
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The Church
Throughout my journey I have tried a few times to see if there was a church which resonated but often found them too restricting, sometimes severe and quite joyless. I remember reading an early book called ‘A Catholic Priest Meets Sai Baba‘ by Don Mario Mazzolini – who realised he had to give up his priesthood when he tried to share unsuccessfully his new found experience with Rome. This summed up for me the sadness that I felt whenever I went to church and saw that they were missing so much from the full divine story.
My John too felt this disillusionment and, as already mentioned, we settled very easily into forming our own church in our lounge for the last fourteen years. We feel as if there are three people in our congregation – us two and God.
Also very interesting is that in the last year the Universe has brought into my awareness the Unitarian Church. I have attended two of their meetings and intend to go next month – below is a resume of this month’s meeting in which I can still see a hope for the future if the churches could use this as a guiding framework for its own resurrection..
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” If you want to know more about Unitarians in UK here’s a good place to start:
https://www.unitarian.org.uk/pages/leaflets
As for us Unitarians in Ringwood, here’s what we did yesterday.
We lit our chalice to some words by Dr Norman Pittenger:
“Give me a humanist or agnostic who cares. In him or her I can see the charity of God working anonymously. Whenever and wherever I see self-giving love, I shall know it is of God.”
Our opening prayer had been sourced from the World Community of Christian Meditation, the community associated with John Main and Laurence Freeman.
We welcomed a visitor from the Quaker community, who professed to have no expectations beforehand, and who said afterwards that the ritual aspects of our gathering for reverence were interesting, and that she intends to come again sometime.
Our readings were from Dan Millman and Rowan Williams, and they both reminded us that the path every person takes is necessarily different, but the paths taken by everyone all ultimately lead to the same end. The learning along the way is different and arises in relation to the personal need.
Our president for the day built on this theme. She spoke frankly about the pitfalls she gets into sometimes; those times when she falls back into the pattern of acting and speaking to others as though her own solutions and models would be better for them, than their own. Her conclusion was that we’re not there to fix it for each other; we are there to accompany each other as we each struggle with our own battles and burdens. And that as the kingdom of God, the realm of reconciliation and peace, lies within, thus personal solutions are provided personally not generically. All we can – and must do – is attend to each other by really listening.
We sang a couple of hymns from the Hymns for Living Unitarian hymnbook and heard a haunting, profound song, sung by Hayley Westernra, from New Zealand.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPBPimxlUnw
After our candles for joys and concerns we concluded with these words by Rev. Johanna (Jopie) Boeke, Unitarian Minister emeritus:
SOMETIMES by Johanna Boeke
Sometimes we are so filled with ourselves, that we only see ourselves, and not the person next to us or opposite us. May we enlarge our souls, and make room for others.
Sometimes we no longer have hope for each other or for ourselves, or for the future. Sometimes we ignore each other, speak only words of pain and separation.
May we be given new words, words of peace, words which create community, words which bring healing and blessing and belief in the future.
May we open our doors and invite others in, feeling safe in spite of our vulnerability.
May we learn to live with each other and for each other.”
Posted By Blogger to “Didymus” – Unitarians in Ringwood on 10/09/2017 09:58:00 am