We give thanks for our church buildings

Dear friends in Christ,

Not a letter as such this month. I hope you won’t mind. Rather I share a couple of prayers I have written and used these last few weeks.

We give thanks for our church building. For the walls soaked with prayer, for all the beauty and artifice they contain and which lift our hearts to God. May this be a thin place where a world beyond this world can be glimpsed.

May this is be a place big enough and robust enough to contain our doubts and uncertainties.

May this be a place where we can lay our anger before God, and risk asking difficult and painful questions of him and of ourselves.

May we welcome those who find here some certainty, alongside those still searching, or journeying with uncertainty and doubt.

Here may we express and expose our humanity in all its strength and confidence, and, in all its weakness and vulnerability.

Here may we encounter the God who would not tell his name, but who in Christ, fully shared our humanity that we might share the glories of his divinity.

Through that same Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit, reigns supreme now and forever.

Amen.

A prayer for our congregation.

Come, Holy Spirit, almighty Sanctifier, God of love, who filled the Virgin Mary with grace, who wonderfully changed the hearts of the apostles, who endowed St Stephen and all Your martyrs with miraculous courage, come and sanctify us. Enlighten our minds, strengthen our wills, purify our consciences, rectify our judgment, set our hearts on fire, and preserve us from the misfortunes of resisting Your inspirations.