Some Questions
At what point(s) during the week did the reading or your reflection come alive?
- If it was a personal experience try to work out what brought it about and why? How did you respond to it? Recall some of the people who helped and give thanks for them.
- If it concerns a local group see if you can spot where things were going wrong. What of the past ought to be abandoned? What of the present ought to be embraced? See if you can find the hand of God in a different tradition, culture or simply a different way of doing things.
- If it concerns the world and its self-seeking attitudes, try to focus on your own life, perhaps identifying ways in which you are involved in and caught up in some the very things you condemn.
- Reflect on idols and symbols, ritual and habit (or custom), Where does one begin and the other end, and at what point does the one merge into the other?
Some Activities
- Convene a discussion or study group to consider the ‘unintended consequences’ of losing the idea of the presence of God (that ‘third party’) in Christian marriage. Is this the point where Christian marriage differs from civil partnerships and secular weddings?
- Recall two or three occasions when change, simply to lift spirits or deal with a problem, proved cosmetic.Think how much better it might have been if prior attention had been given to the underlying issues.
- Beginning with faith and worship in your own community make a brief list of what you value most for spiritual growth, what you simply accept (maybe even tolerate) and what you can happily dismiss. See if you can persuade a few friends to do the same and then discuss your findings.