Christ Episcopal Church
	Riverton, New Jersey
	Fight Languid Prayer and Dull Faith (see below for details) March 2007 Look Father, look on his anointed face And only look on us as found in him; Look not on our misusings of thy grace Our prayer so languid and our faith so dim… I find these words by William Bright, which come from verse two of Hymn 337 to be among the most moving of all our hymn texts. They remind us of how reliant we must be on the love of Christ Jesus given the extent to which we fall short of the glory of God. That final line always gets to me: 'our prayer so languid and our faith so dim. For I often find myself feeling that my time with God is indeed languid (lacking energy or vitality; weak) and my belief in God's goodness a faint approximation of what it ought to be. This hymn came to mind as I was doing some research on a website dealing with attitudes of members of various Christian denominations. What disturbed me was barely one-third of Episcopalians polled attended church on any given Sunday and 44% stated that their faith had little or no impact on their daily lives and occupations. This put Episcopalians dead last among Christians in these two categories. Ouch! Talk about languid prayer and dim faith! When I compared the first statistic to Christ Church’s congregation, I saw that, while we saw slightly less than half of our communicants (people who receive Communion at least three times a year) on a weekly basis between September and June, our average attendance is almost exactly one-third of our membership list. I find it of particular concern since Anglicans consider the connection between faith and gathering together for public prayer essential to Christian life and growth. That is the reason why we worship out of the Book of Common, not individual, Prayer. This methodology is summed up in the Latin phrase 'Lex orandi, lex credendi', that is, the law of prayer is the law of belief. What this means is that a person’s worship not only reflects what he or she believes, but ultimately shapes that belief. This osmosis-like absorption of prayer, faith, scripture and theology has been a successful means of Christian growth for 500 years. It is a bit of a spiritual chicken and egg: if we show up and participate, we grow and in that growth we are moved to show up and participate more intentionally. But if we don’t worship much, we don’t get much, and because we don’t get much, we practice it even less. The latter attitude creates a downward spiral that, unless arrested, sends our souls down the proverbial drain. The season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday, February 6^th. It is traditionally the season in which Christian people, virtually since the beginning of our faith, take the time and make the effort to get themselves back into spiritual shape. I encourage you to make a commitment to be in church at least once a week, take time for daily prayer, read the Bible (select a book, like Matthew or Genesis and take a chapter a day, let’s say). Participate in the Wednesday bible study or the Lenten programs on Wednesday nights. If you can’t worship on Sunday, come Wednesday mornings or Thursday evenings. Whatever you decide to do, or not, make the decision to be above the Episcopalian average, at least for the next six weeks. Make use, and not mis-use of God’s grace, so that by Easter we find ourselves closer to verse four of Hymn 337: And so we come; O draw us to thy feet, Most patient Savior, who canst love us still… In thine own service make us glad and free, And grant us nevermore to part from thee. Keep a holy and blessed Lent, and see you in church?! Richard+