Prayer 15
Worship
Prayers for the Age of Technology
Object:
Dear Lord:
Are we becoming irreligious because we are changing our perspective on human culture?
The view in the past, as we are keenly aware, was that the way of life practiced by a people was prescribed and directly given by you or some other mystical entity. Now, however, the prevailing view is that it is the product of group life. Our behavioral codes, and moral values, that formerly were considered commandments, laws, and values established by your decree, are now looked upon as folkways, mores, customs, and values developed in the course of our society's experience.
Does this mean a faithless denial of your role in human history? Are we to be condemned for it?
We can see the danger of a crude humanism concluding that there is no connection with anything beyond the limited horizon and time-bound plane of earthly existence. Save us, we pray, from such a spiritual catastrophe. Help us to discover and learn how to celebrate your presence and participation with us in ways not heretofore understood.
Forgive us for suspecting that we have been misled by past notions that the human world of culture must be considered evil -- secular in contrast to sacred. We find it hard to believe that this is really condemned by you as "the world," from which we are commanded to "come out."
We recognize that error and sin make our shared way of life less than you desire it to be. But have you not been interacting with us through all the process of its development?
We think we sense your presence in: 1) the impulses and needs with which our original nature is endowed; 2) the drives that impel us toward experimentation, valuing, and fulfillment; 3) the capacity for discernment that makes choice and valuing possible; 4) the provision of an environment that lends itself encouragingly to our importunities; and 5) the gift of freedom to learn, and the ability to retain what is learned, through trial and error. You are, as we are beginning to see, always present with us, interacting with us encouragingly and judgmentally, in the culture-developing process.
Please do not look upon us only as sinners, obstinate and evil. Do not despair of us as we struggle to know you better, to understand better your continuing revelations of yourself.
Help us to know whether we are right in accepting these evolving views. Grant us relief from the anxiety we are experiencing as we yield to the compulsion to cast off moorings to contradictory traditional understandings.
In the name of Jesus, we pray, Amen.
Are we becoming irreligious because we are changing our perspective on human culture?
The view in the past, as we are keenly aware, was that the way of life practiced by a people was prescribed and directly given by you or some other mystical entity. Now, however, the prevailing view is that it is the product of group life. Our behavioral codes, and moral values, that formerly were considered commandments, laws, and values established by your decree, are now looked upon as folkways, mores, customs, and values developed in the course of our society's experience.
Does this mean a faithless denial of your role in human history? Are we to be condemned for it?
We can see the danger of a crude humanism concluding that there is no connection with anything beyond the limited horizon and time-bound plane of earthly existence. Save us, we pray, from such a spiritual catastrophe. Help us to discover and learn how to celebrate your presence and participation with us in ways not heretofore understood.
Forgive us for suspecting that we have been misled by past notions that the human world of culture must be considered evil -- secular in contrast to sacred. We find it hard to believe that this is really condemned by you as "the world," from which we are commanded to "come out."
We recognize that error and sin make our shared way of life less than you desire it to be. But have you not been interacting with us through all the process of its development?
We think we sense your presence in: 1) the impulses and needs with which our original nature is endowed; 2) the drives that impel us toward experimentation, valuing, and fulfillment; 3) the capacity for discernment that makes choice and valuing possible; 4) the provision of an environment that lends itself encouragingly to our importunities; and 5) the gift of freedom to learn, and the ability to retain what is learned, through trial and error. You are, as we are beginning to see, always present with us, interacting with us encouragingly and judgmentally, in the culture-developing process.
Please do not look upon us only as sinners, obstinate and evil. Do not despair of us as we struggle to know you better, to understand better your continuing revelations of yourself.
Help us to know whether we are right in accepting these evolving views. Grant us relief from the anxiety we are experiencing as we yield to the compulsion to cast off moorings to contradictory traditional understandings.
In the name of Jesus, we pray, Amen.
