We pray for the Anglican Church in Sydney. Many Christians feel disillusioned with the Anglican Church in Sydney when faced with intolerance and those leaders of communities who validate intolerance. Intolerance is a sin. It is contrary to God’s will for love, peace, equality, justice and compassion for all. It is an affront to human dignity and a gross violation of human rights

We pray for those who desecrate God’s likeness. Human dignity is a gift from God to all. God’s image and likeness in in every person.  Human rights are the protection we give to human dignity.

We pray for those who persue intolorance and, who through monstrous lies and deceits of Satan, devise to destroy the life of the believers.

We pray for those who speak for intolerance and all its evil manifestations.

We pray for those who sanctify and affirm life in all its fullness.

We pray for those who follow the gospel mandate that “all may be one” (John 17:21)

I appreciate the sentiment of your prayer.

My Bible reading this morning was James 1:19 ff: “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.”

Hate is not a fruit of the spirit to say the least.

For myself, I often focus on the ‘not becoming angry part’ rather than the ‘be quick to listen’ part. I am praying that I will learn to listen rather than my usual strategy of deflecting conflict when it arises… I am learning that by merely avoiding conflict I can often hieghten the anger of others (eg my wife!). Truly listening to those you disagree is a very difficult skill to master.

All this said however, I do wonder if contemplative’s prayer is wrapped to some degree in its own intolerance. I would be far more comfortable with a prayer that did not single out Anglicans in Sydney. All of us (whatever our churchmanship and location in the world) struggle with intolerance and our human weaknesses that make it hard to ‘be quick to listen’ to those we disagree.

Let us all pray for this fruit of the spirit:

“Almighty Father, we pray that all Anglicans will be quick to listen and slow to anger. Full of love for each other as human beings equally unworthy of God’s grace. Let us cast aside our hatred that does not bring about the righteous life you desire for us. Amen”

Dear Contemplative,

I’m a little confused by your approach to prayer. You begin each paragraph ‘We pray for’ and then name a category of person, which several times then digresses into an explanation of your belief. Are you informing God of your theology? Or perhaps instructing him how things are or should be?

Also, what are you actually asking God for those people? You have stated the subject of your prayer in each case (those who x, those who y) but asked nothing for them.

I’m happy to ‘tolerate’ people who pray differently, but I’d like to encourage you to ‘contemplate’ what prayer actually is. Please forgive the force of my honesty, but this reads more like a thinly veiled attack on the ‘diocese’ in the wrong section of ‘forums’, than a humble approach to Almighty God.

In Christian fellowship
Matt

Thanks for your comments Matthew.

My words of prayer were simply taken from those words of the Archbishop of Sydney and Bishop Glenn Davies.

You can understand that many Anglicans feel under attack at the moment.

We all pray for peace and unity in diversity

[PR] Anglican Church Intolerance

[Edit] - Ken, see this thread . Contemplative, you are wanted in said thread.

Luke