75
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FINDING PEACE IN THE MESS THE REV. DR. CHRISTOPHER D. GIRATA, RECTOR
A
couple weeks ago, I checked in with the new Head of the Saint Michael Episcopal School, Netra Fitzgerald (pronounced Nee-trah). As you can imagine, running a school in the middle of this pandemic is hard enough, but she is new to her role. Just this summer, after the quarantine began, Netra arrived from her former role at Greenhill to become the head of SMES. Such a hard moment of transition! Yet, whenever I see her, she exudes optimism and positivity. When I checked in with her, I asked her how she was doing and made it clear I really meant it. I wanted to check in with her more deeply than the passing, shallow, “all’s good” people often share. Netra paused a moment and said, very authentically, that she was actually doing well because for the first time in her professional life, she is working in an environment where she prays every day with her coworkers. Prayer—such a simple idea—but one that has made all the difference for my friend. Prayer is something I take for granted, given I do what I do, but prayer is something powerful that many people don’t get to share with their coworkers. I imagine the vast majority of you reading this do not gather regularly with your colleagues and pray. I might even venture to say that the majority of you don’t even pray regularly on your own. Now before you jump to any conclusions or check out of this column, let me make myself clear: Prayer is important, and not simply as a function of religion, but most importantly as a way to center yourself, to ground yourself in a spiritual sense. Prayer is an opportunity for each of us to acknowledge that there is more to life than what we see with our eyes. We can use moments of prayer to anchor ourselves in a deeper truth than what our world offers. Let’s have a moment of real talk: Life is hard. This pandemic is hard, addressing social change is hard, anticipating the coming election is hard, and on and on. The weight of our world seems to be piling up on our shoulders and pulling down our psyches each day, which makes prayer all the more important.
I admit that prayer is not comfortable for most people, if for no other reason that we don’t think we’re “good” at it. Please let me dispel the notion that you need to be good at praying for good things to happen. Not true at all. Prayer is time spent focusing beyond yourself, calming your spirit, and finding quiet that can get lost in the noise of the world. So today, my Saint Michael friends, I’m encouraging you to find a way to pray each day. Our tradition is rich with prayer models and expressions that can help us all deepen our prayer life. Included below is a “Rule of 6” chart from the Diocese of Oxford in England that can help us all in this extraordinary moment in history. I hope these rules can be a gift to us to help us live well, rooted in prayer. We all need to find some peace in our messy lives right now, so get to searching for the peace you deserve. Yes, prayer will take some practice, but believe me, you’re worth the effort.
"RULE OF 6" Living with COVID-19 will be hard for everyone this winter. The Rule of 6 offers lessons from which we can draw in order to live well during these difficult times. >6 MONTHS IS THE NEW HORIZON Focus on Easter, leaning back into the great themes of the church year.
>6 DAYS TO WORK & A SABBATH TO REST Reclaim the gifts of one day each week for rest and recreation.
>6 PEOPLE TO JOURNEY WITH Rediscover church as small groups of people supporting one another.
>6 WAYS TO BE SALT & LIGHT Identify the people and community organizations you can support.
>6 PERCENT TO YOUR CHURCH If your income is stable, increase your giving to sustain the local church
>6 PEOPLE TO PRAY FOR Pray for people you know to discover the riches of our faith. "...neither death,nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, not things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:37-29 oxford.anglican.org/six
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THE ARCHANGEL | LATE FALL 2020
