During the
Hong Kong Continuing Indaba Encounter, many of us were struck by the words of
the confession that was being used in the Church of Hong Kong. It was exactly the same as the words we pray
in the Canadian modern Eucharistic liturgy, with the exception of the lines
that have been bolded:
Most
merciful God,
we confess
that we have sinned
against you
in thought, word and deed,
by what we
have done, and by what we have left
undone.
We have not
loved you with our whole heart;
we have not
loved our neighbours as ourselves.
We are truly
sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake
of your Son Jesus Christ have mercy on us,
Forgive what we have been,
Amend what we are,
And direct what we shall be,
That we may
delight in you will, and walk in your ways,
to the glory
of you Name. Amen. (The Holy Eucharist, Rite Two, Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui)
We attempt
to pray our prayer of confession each week intentionally and thoughtfully. The words are a part of us and many of us can
pray them without the book. When a text
becomes a part of us in such a way it is a gift. It is a resource upon which we can draw in
times of need. We have the words to call
out to God when we have done something wrong, even when we do not have a prayer
book in front of us. And yet, words like
these, as dear as they are to us, can become stale at times. We long for the spirit to wake us from our
slumber. I think that for many of us
from the Canadian team, we were awoken that first day in Hong Kong when these
words broke the pattern to which we were so accustomed. At first, it was slightly frustrating – the
prayer we knew and loved so well was interrupted. Quickly, though we realized
it was a divine interruption, an interruption that proclaimed, “Sleeper wake!
Rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you!” These few additional words jarred us and
then opened us to new possibilities, new hope, new grace: “Forgive what we have
been, amend what we are and direct what we shall be,” are words that invited us
into the story of grace in a new and meaningful way. They are entirely consistent with what we
believe, and yet, their sense of newness helped us to prayer an old familiar
prayer in a fresh and thoughtful way. As
the week unfolded, many of us worked this additional line into our theology of
confession and absolution, our theology of sin and grace, and into our theology
of hope. We believe as we pray and pray
as we believe.
c. 2012, the Rev. Daniel F. Graves
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