Wednesday Prayer Online
from 7:00-7:30pm
Wednesday Bible Study Online
from 7:30pm-8:30pm
Thursday Book Study Online
from 7:30pm-8:30pm
Wednesday Services from September to the end of May:
7:00-7:30pm 1st Wednesday of the month Labyrinth Walk (occasionally combined with a Healing Service, i.e., prayer walking & sacrament of anointing); 2nd Wed. Taizé Prayer Service (readings from the Bible, guided meditaton and meditative songs); 3rd Wed. Contemplative Eucharist (guided meditation and holy communion); 4th Wed. Evening Prayer (Evensong). 5th Wed. Drop-in Guided Meditation (no experience or preparation needed). Come as you are and whenever you can. These midweek services will last about 30 minutes and they all are meant to help us stop in the midst of our weekly activities and be mindful of and grateful for the presence of God in our lives.
Wednesday BBQ and Bible Study during the summer months:
6:00pm gathering for the BBQ
6:30pm saying grace and eating
Send your orders (Burger, Cheese Burger, Sausage or vegetarian side dishes and dessert) by 3pm on Wednesday by phoning the office at 705-722-7111 and leaving a message or email at stthomasshantybay@toronto.anglican.ca
7:15pm clean up and setting up for the Bible Study
7:30pm Bible Study
8:30pm Closing prayer
Here follows a brief description of some types of Christian prayer by the Anglican Fellowship of Prayer Canada:
Prayer is at the centre of the spiritual life of a Christian. It is connecting and communicating with God. It is the essence of our relationship with God. Prayer is a privilege, not a duty. Like all good things it requires some discipline.
The Anglican Book of Common Prayer and the Book of Alternative Services provide many useful prayer resources for corporate prayer in worship services and personal prayer.
However, beyond worship services there are as many ways of praying as there are individuals. Our personalities and life experiences influence how we pray, and there are many different Types of Christian Prayer.
Christian Meditation
Meditation is a Universal Tradition found in all the great religions. As such, it offers an important common ground for inter-religious dialog and a basis for peace in the world. Many Christians have been helped to recover contact with their own tradition of meditation, or contemplative prayer, because of the work of Fr. John Main, who is the inspiration of the World Community of Christian Meditation.
Centering Prayer
Centering Prayer is a method of silent prayer that prepares us to receive the gift of contemplative prayer, prayer in which we experience God's presence within us, closer than breathing, closer than thinking, closer than consciousness itself. This method of prayer is both a relationship with God and a discipline to foster that relationship.
Praying for Others
Praying for others is often called intercessory prayer. Intercessory prayer invites us into God's care and concern for us, our families and friends, and the entire world. No concern is too trivial for God to receive with loving attention. However, intercession is not a means of manipulating heaven into doing our will. Rather it is a way we become aware of god's will for a person or situation and we join with god in that situation.
Our desire is to turn our concerns and worries into prayer; to enter God's heart for the world and then pray from there.
Pastoral Care and Prayer
Jesus calls all of us to care for and to be “present” to others. Pastoral Care is a ministry of “presence”, based on faith and prayer to provide support and love to those who are in need. Pastoral Care is a journey shared in a concerned relationship, and the journey is equally significant in the lives of both travellers and to God.
Depending on the circumstances, it may be appropriate for a pastoral visitor to pray with and/or for the person being visited. If there is any doubt the visitor should ask the person they are visiting if they would like the visitor to pray for and/or with them. Using familiar prayers is frequently the most comforting to someone who is in distress. Some useful prayers can be found at Traditional Prayers.
Healing Prayer
Healing prayer is perhaps best summarized in the phrase: “Christian healing is Jesus Christ meeting a person at his/her point of greatest need.” Jesus does the healing, not us. Those praying for healing are channels of God’s healing power and love. The “Gift of Healing” is given to those for whom we pray, not to those who do the praying. Christian healing involves the well being of the whole person: body; mind; and spirit. Often spiritual and emotional healing is needed before physical healing can take place. In praying for healing we are praying for wholeness.
Jesus said: “As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.” (Matt. 10:7-8).
Music & Prayer
Music plays a part in most people's lives and can be listened to on various levels of our intellect and emotions. Music can be used in our prayer life in various ways. For some, music can be used as an introduction to their prayer time and maybe to round it off. For others, music is prayer. An excellent example being Taizé music with its repeated phrases.
There are many musical styles that can be used with prayer and in addition to traditional tunes and words 'secular' and even popular styles as well as specifically 'religious' music are often used. Different types of music can be used for different topics in a prayer session, e.g. thanksgiving, penitence, petition, intercession.
Taizé
The Taizé Community is an ecumenical Christian monastic order in Taizé, Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy, France. It is composed of a little over 100 brothers who come from Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant traditions. Over 100,000 young people from around the world make pilgrimages to Taizé each year for prayer, Bible study, sharing, and communal work.
The community, though Western European in origin, seeks to welcome people and traditions from across the globe. This is reflected in the music and prayers where songs are sung in many languages, and increasingly include chants and icons from the Eastern Orthodox tradition. The music emphasises simple phrases, usually lines from Psalms or other pieces of Scripture, repeated and sometimes also sung in canon. The repetition is intended to aid meditation and prayer. Much of the earlier Taizé community music was conceived and composed by Jacques Berthier. Later Joseph Gelineau became a major contributor to the music. Taizé many places across the world, ecumenical prayers using music from Taizé are organised by people, young and old, who have been in touch with the community. The community's website provides reflections, prayers, and songs for use in local prayers.
Prayer & Art
Throughout history, Christians have used art as a tool of informing and educating people about the Good News of Jesus and the contents of Scripture, particularly in cultures and circumstances where the general population could not read or write. Art has also been used, most notably by the eastern Church as a tool to connect with God in prayer. This is exemplified in the use of Icons in prayer.
Art can also be used as a tool for Christians to express their spirituality and as a form of prayer.
Many churches in the Diocese are decorated with stained glass windows that add to the ambiance and prayer awareness in the buildings.
Prayer While Moving
Some people do their best and are most comfortable praying while they are moving. Prayer Walking can be a wonderful gift for those who like to get up and move around while intentionally communicating with God. Prayer Walking can be done in any location at any time, sometimes alone or with a group. Examples of praying while moving are: Prayer Labyrinths; praying the Stations of the Cross and Pilgrimages.
Prayer Labyrinths
Unlike a maze, the labyrinth has a single path leading to the center with no loops, cul-de-sacs or forks. They all share the basic features of an entrance or mouth, a single circuitous path and a center or goal. The labyrinth is a universal symbol for the world, with its complications and difficulties, which we experience on our journey through life. The entry to the labyrinth is birth; the center is death and eternal life. In Christian terms, the thread that leads us through life is divine grace. Like any pilgrimage, the labyrinth represents the inner pilgrimage we are called to make to take us to the center of our being.
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What is a Labyrinth?
A labyrinth is a geometric pattern that has one opening and a circuitous path that leads to the centre. It is different than a maze, for mazes have more than one opening, dead ends, and different possible paths. Not so with a labyrinth: there are no dead ends, you can’t get lost. One simply follows the winding path into the centre, the goal of the journey. What the centre represents is different for each one. Like the journey of life, the path of the labyrinth winds close to the centre, and sometimes far away. Yet, in the midst of the journey we are always held by God, “in whom we live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17:28).
The first Christian use of the labyrinth as a spiritual tool appeared in a fourth-century Basilica in Orleansville, Algeria, which contained the words “Sancta Ecclesia,” indicating its use for religious purposes. In the medieval Christian church, the labyrinth played a part in the ceremonies surrounding Easter. The labyrinths in the great cathedrals of France (in the 12th century) may have been part of the journey of devout Christians who, no longer able to travel to the Middle East because of unsettled conditions, made their pilgrimages on the labyrinths...
“Your word is a lamp that gives light wherever I walk.” (Psalm 119:105)
“You direct me on the path that leads to life.” (Psalm 16:11)
