Went into Church bookstore/ giftshop and saw a non-Christian prayer hanging on the door

[SSPXwannaB]

Today I went into the bookstore of the local Church to buy a couple of things for an Altar in my room. They had many lovely items. I bought a free standing Crucifix and a little Holy Water glass jar with a medallion of Holy Mary and Jesus Christ on it.

I was troubled by a large Apache Indian prayer they had hanging on their door that stated:

“May the sun bring you new energy every day. May the moon softly restore you by night. May the rain wash away your worries. May the breeze blow new strength into your being…”

It was the only thing on the door and was very prominent; you could not enter without passing it. It also had a pagan symbol under it.

I was about to say something (I’m the guy that speaks up when someone is cussing in front of children in public) because I was alone at the register with two ladies, but then two customers walked up. I did not want to embarass anyone or cause harm to anyone’s faith in that Church, so I decided to write a letter instead.

I am 3/8 Indian and look it, but I feel that such things have no place in a Roman Catholic Church. My faith comes before my race.

 

[Yellow_Belle]

Today I went into the bookstore of the local Church to buy a couple of things for an Altar in my room. They had many lovely items. I bought a free standing Crucifix and a little Holy Water glass jar with a medallion of Holy Mary and Jesus Christ on it.

I was troubled by a large Apache Indian prayer they had hanging on their door that stated:

“May the sun bring you new energy every day. May the moon softly restore you by night. May the rain wash away your worries. May the breeze blow new strength into your being…”

It was the only thing on the door and was very prominent; you could not enter without passing it. It also had a pagan symbol under it.

I was about to say something (I’m the guy that speaks up when someone is cussing in front of children in public) because I was alone at the register with two ladies, but then two customers walked up. I did not want to embarass anyone or cause harm to anyone’s faith in that Church, so I decided to write a letter instead.

I am 3/8 Indian and look it, but I feel that such things have no place in a Roman Catholic Church. My faith comes before my race.

Personally, I don’t find anything wrong with this.

It’s in a bookstore - albeit a Catholic one - not a church, and it’s not being used in any liturgical sense.

And it’s not so much a prayer - in the sense that it’s directed to God or a god - it’s more of a blessing, a wish for someone’s good. It reminds me a lot of that ancient Gaelic blessing:

May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face;
the rains fall soft upon your fields …

What was the nature of the pagan symbol?

 

[Joe_Kelley]

From what you say it is not evident to whom the prayer is being addressed. Is it the Almighty Who controls these material things or the material things themselves? It has some similarities to an acceptable Irish blessing that I can’t find at the moment.

 

[malachi3]

Sorry, this would irritate me to no end. There must be a million Christian prayers available to hang on one’s door. May the rain wash away your worries? yeah, that happens.

 

[Yellow_Belle]

Sorry, this would irritate me to no end. There must be a million Christian prayers available to hang on one’s door. May the rain wash away your worries? yeah, that happens.

Poetic licence. Like the ‘road rising to meet you’, or ‘the wind being always at your back’.

It is certainly no worse than Max Ehrmann’s Desiderata which I once heard a very high profile and conservative bishop quote to a confirmation class.

 

[rskempf]

When you go back, look for any books by Joan Chittister. She is a leader of dissent in our church. I have a hunch this shop has been overrun by liberal elements. This would be definitive proof.

I had a Director of Religious Education (DRE) at our parish for over 8 years that had a dreamcatcher hanging in her doorway. You had to duck to get past this piece. Later in her term with us, she led several times a spiritual exercise with about 30 catechists. It was a chant like Taize prayer but recited repeatedly “om nama shiviya” which means I bow to the god of shiva. This was only the tip of the iceberg.

Today, our religious education program is down to about 40% in terms of enrollment.

The destruction was/is amazing.

Beware!

 

[Cecilianus]

I’m not sure that there’s anything directly opposed to the Faith in that “prayer”, but it seems to me to have a problem most forms of non-Christian “spirituality” have.

Banality.

It doesn’t really say anything intelligent or meaningful. If it’s a prayer to God, then it’s really vague; it seems like just a feel-good wish, with about as much spiritual value as saying “have a nice day”.

And I would need to ask a textual critic to explain to me the nuances of what exactly it means by “strength” and “energy”. It must be a phrase or manner of speaking whose definite meaning is lost to me, probably because I usually miss nuances and interpret everything literally (a personal flaw). But taken literally in the scientific senses of the terms “strength” and “energy”, it’s meaningless.

Being a nature lover and a Romantic by temperament, I can certainly understand the regenerative feeling you get when being in nature, away from the stupidity and noise of mindless electronic amusement and city life, but if that’s what they were trying to convey, they would have been a lot more successful with a selection from Wordsworth.

 

[Cecilianus]

When you go back, look for any books by Joan Chittister. She is a leader of dissent in our church. I have a hunch this shop has been overrun by liberal elements. This would be definitive proof.

I had a Director of Religious Education (DRE) at our parish for over 8 years that had a dreamcatcher hanging in her doorway. You had to duck to get past this piece. Later in her term with us, she led several times a spiritual exercise with about 30 catechists. It was a chant like Taize prayer but recited repeatedly “om nama shiviya” which means I bow to the god of shiva. This was only the tip of the iceberg.

Today, our religious education program is down to about 40% in terms of enrollment.

The destruction was/is amazing.

Beware!

I think the chant means something more like “hail to the name of Siva”. (Om is the sacred syllable - which itself in some manner contains the whole Godhead, as the name of “Jesus” does in some way for Christians - and “nama” means name; I don’t know Sanskrit grammar well enough to comment on shiviya or siviya. Sanskrit tends to use a lot fewer words than English does to express things, though.)

That doesn’t make it a whit better, though.

 

[wraithx]

The comment of the posters before me are not wrong - in that they say that this is not a “prayer” per se - it is not idolatrous as it does not imply a power attributed to these natural things which belongs to God Himself.

BUT: why would they put this poem up instead of a prayer of St Thomas (re learning), or any other of the wonderful prayers of our Holy Mother Church?

My opinion? Avoid. A Catholic person would not put this in the prime spot in their store. A modernist might. A liberal might. A politically correct person might. A Catholic wouldn’t.

 

[Cluny]

<>

And just what “pagan symbol” did it have under it?

The same emblem can have different meaning in diffrerent contexts.

At a pro-life rally, Melkites brought their Church Flag, which shows a double-headed eagle. A pop-evangelical (zealous but not learned) complained about a “masonic flag.” I pointed out to him that this also stands for the union of two natures in Christ.

The ancient Egyptian word “ankh” means “life.” The Ankh emblem resembles the Greek monogram for Christ Chi-Rho. So to an Egyptian Christian what some find objectionable means, “In the Cross of Christ is life.”

So, to repeat my question, what pagan symbol did you see there?

 

[Jacafamala]

A Catholic bookstore has no business putting up Indian prayers. Heck, our own children don’t even know our own traditional Catholic prayers, many of them. Let’s focus on our own prayers. And their parents don’t know the Catholic prayers, either. Let’s focus on filling our heads with these. That’s not to much to ask, is it? I’d look for a better bookstore, personally. Or else order online.

 

[truevaticanii]

Today I went into the bookstore of the local Church to buy a couple of things for an Altar in my room. They had many lovely items. I bought a free standing Crucifix and a little Holy Water glass jar with a medallion of Holy Mary and Jesus Christ on it.

I was troubled by a large Apache Indian prayer they had hanging on their door that stated:

“May the sun bring you new energy every day. May the moon softly restore you by night. May the rain wash away your worries. May the breeze blow new strength into your being…”

It was the only thing on the door and was very prominent; you could not enter without passing it. It also had a pagan symbol under it.

I was about to say something (I’m the guy that speaks up when someone is cussing in front of children in public) because I was alone at the register with two ladies, but then two customers walked up. I did not want to embarass anyone or cause harm to anyone’s faith in that Church, so I decided to write a letter instead.

I am 3/8 Indian and look it, but I feel that such things have no place in a Roman Catholic Church. My faith comes before my race./QUOTE

you sound like you would love Bl. Imelda Lambertini if you are buildin’ altars! She did this many times in her home… I to construct many Tridentine altars… dreaming of a day when no Novus Ordo altar would sit around like a regular table… so much more happens at that table than simply a physical-nourishing meal… it is a spiritual meal but also a sacrifice!

 

[truevaticanii]

Sorry, this would irritate me to no end. There must be a million Christian prayers available to hang on one’s door. May the rain wash away your worries? yeah, that happens.

it is that the tone is so modernistic and new-age-like… it sounds like a prayer Indians would say because they truly believed that the rain wold wipe away worries and such…

the only other way to twist that —that I can currently think of would be to say that God gave us rain to also remind us that, like the dirt that is wiped off the road by the rain, we should let Christ wipe away our worries to focus on Him for a change.

 

[Timothysis]

A Catholic bookstore has no business putting up Indian prayers.

Perhaps when you open your own bookstore you can put up any prayer you wish, hum?

 

[SSPXwannaB]

Sorry, this would irritate me to no end. There must be a million Christian prayers available to hang on one’s door. May the rain wash away your worries? yeah, that happens.

I agree with the “…million Christian prayers available…” statement, which was my feeling. This is not some Catholic Bookstore about town, it is a bookstore at the Roman Catholic Church.They had books like ‘Three women’s spiritual journey: A Muslim, a Jew and a Catholic’, and ‘How the centralization of the Church is harming it’, and lots of feminist books. They also had communist art, and Hindu art depicting a religious elephant thing. I heard them speaking about eastern meditation and spiritualism in glowing terms a couple of times.

Rigor mortis if a Catholic book store in a Church were to be wholly (holy) Catholic.

 

[Cecilianus]

I agree with the “…million Christian prayers available…” statement, which was my feeling. This is not some Catholic Bookstore about town, it is a bookstore at the Roman Catholic Church.They had books like ‘Three women’s spiritual journey: A Muslim, a Jew and a Catholic’, and ‘How the centralization of the Church is harming it’, and lots of feminist books. They also had communist art, and Hindu art depicting a religious elephant thing. I heard them speaking about eastern meditation and spiritualism in glowing terms a couple of times.

Rigor mortis if a Catholic book store in a Church were to be wholly (holy) Catholic.

What do you mean by “communist art”?

 

[Phemie]

T
I was troubled by a large Apache Indian prayer they had hanging on their door that stated:

“May the sun bring you new energy every day. May the moon softly restore you by night. May the rain wash away your worries. May the breeze blow new strength into your being…”

To me that’s just a fancy way of saying “Have a good day.”

 

[Cluny]

What do you mean by “communist art”?

You’ll probably get the same answer to my question about what pagan symbol was under the door.

Question–had that message on the door NOT been identified as an Indian prayer, how would SSPXwannaB have felt about it?

(Since SSPX clergy exercise NO licit ministry in the Catholic Church, according to two different statements by Pope Benedict this year, why does someone who calls himself traditional Catholic “wannaB” part of it?)

And I just happened to think–would it be appropriate to have a Christian prayer casually mounted on the door, probably flapping and banging around, and glanced at and otherwise treated casually?

 

[Cecilianus]

To me that’s just a fancy way of saying “Have a good day.”

I.e., it’s not a prayer - which is why it’s problematic to portray it (as it evidently was - and things of that nature generally are) as a “prayer” or as a form of “Native American spirituality”.

The big problem with a lot of non-Christian “religions” sometimes isn’t so what they have as what they lack. Zen, other forms of Eastern meditation, mythology, and the Vedanta simply aren’t religion. They lack a transcendent character that raises them above the purely human.

 

[Cecilianus]

You’ll probably get the same answer to my question about what pagan symbol was under the door.

I would like an answer to that question too.

Question–had that message on the door NOT been identified as an Indian prayer, how would SSPXwannaB have felt about it?

He needs to answer for himself, but here’s what my response would be (since frankly, I don’t give a d*mn where it came from):

What a bunch of meaningless idiotic liberal cr*p.

(Since SSPX clergy exercise NO licit ministry in the Catholic Church, according to two different statements by Pope Benedict this year, why does someone who calls himself traditional Catholic “wannaB” part of it?)

And I just happened to think–would it be appropriate to have a Christian prayer casually mounted on the door, probably flapping and banging around, and glanced at and otherwise treated casually?

It could be appropriate, though I’m not really sure. Due to the Incarnation, prayer can be a physical thing, not just a spiritual one - and the Tibetan practice of prayer wheels or prayer flags (where the prayer is said by the flag upon which it is written flapping in the wind, or by a wheel turning) could have a legitimate theological justification in that respect. We don’t need to be actually, mentally thinking the words of the prayer for a prayer to be said.

But in that case, the prayer should be either mounted on an icon or actually written on a flag.

(Of course, Tibetan prayer wheels have plenty of separate problems, beginning with the fact that not all Tibetan Buddhists understand their religion as being monotheistic, leaving a huge problem as to the question who or what are they praying to and why. And they don’t have any notion of the Incarnation, and in fact are explicitly Gnostic in regards to the soul’s fall into matter. But the idea of writing a prayer instead - or as well as - repeating it vocally shouldn’t necessarily be problematic under all circumstances.)