The Beauty of a Litany

In reading Mother Theresa’s “Prayer for the Poor,” I was seeing the beauty of Litany for the first time in my rather longer life. When I was young the only thing that I remember from liturgies that had litanies was the response, or “ora pro nobis”. I remember the phrase and the rhythm that could come with the saying of the litanies in Latin and then later in English. Now in the reading of her prayer, I see a beauty, a beauty of looking at God or in this case Jesus in many different lights. Scripture is my main way of thinking of Jesus and in that I am only concentrating in one aspect of his existence at a time whereas in the prayer I go from the “Word made Flesh” to the “bread of Life” in the next line. What a way to slowly mediate on him. She then moves into descriptors and then action to be taken. The Word to be- spoken, the truth-to be told, the way- to be walked, the light to be lit. For the first time I am seeing that there is meaning in litany. Jesus is the sick- to be healed; Jesus is the leper- to wash his hands. Jesus is the Crippled- to walk with him.
This is a great way to look at Jesus in different ways. We get to comfortable with the singular vision that we have of Jesus over time, this helps us to expand that vision. Jesus is both the victim and the helper. This prayer, this litany is a call to us for the various ministries of Jesus.
This can also lead us into making up our own litany at some time.

Least of my Bretheren

In today’s world that is in today’s environment everyone is trying to lead a “name brand” life. We want to be seen as Pravda and Polo. If need to be in. If we aren’t at that level yet we yearn to be there. Woe be us if our shirts are bear with no identity on them for us to assume.
I have discovered that it is OK to lead a “Generic Life”. It is in freeing ourselves from the name brands that we can begin to be ourselves. If we are too busy assuming “popular” lives, we will never develop our own.
It is not in assuming preconceived personalities that we develop our own. If we live with proper humility we can have that generic life. We will than have more interest in our efforts at life than our egos
A life of Christianity is not a life of one up manship; it is a life of quiet community service and prayer, therefore quite generic. But by being generic in this we can truly be part of community.
A Generic way of life presents you as just like the other guy on the outside. You can then concentrating on developing your sense of the “inside”.