Hospitality (1)

 A Familiar Stranger

I saw a stranger today.

I put food for him in the eating-place

And drink in the drinking-place

And music in the listening-place.

In the Holy name of the Trinity

He blessed myself and my family.

And the lark said in her warble

Often, often,often

Goes Christ in the stranger's guise.

O, oft and oft and oft,

Goes Christ in the stranger's guise.

Celtic proverb  

graphic: Emmaus Road 

living water reprint from 2009

Bless to Me Oh God

Bless to me, O God, 
the moon that is above me, 
bless to me, O God, 
the earth that is beneath me, 
bless to me, O God, 
my wife
and my children
and bless, O God, 
myself
who have care of them.
                                            Bless to me
                                             my wife and my children, 
                                          and bless, O God, 
                                             myself, 
                                             who have care of them. 
                                             Bless, O God, the thing 
                                             on which my eye doth rest, 
                                             Bless, O God, the thing 
                                             on which my hope doth rest, 
                                             Bless, O God, my reason
                                             and 
                                             my purpose, 
                                             Bless, O bless Thou them, 
                                             Thou, 
                                             God of life; 
                                             Bless, O God, 
                                             my reason and my purpose, 
                                             Bless, O Bless
                                            Thou them, 
                                            Thou, God of Life


reciter: Dugall MacAulay

living water reprint from 2009

My Souls Healer

My soul's Healer,

Keep me at even,

Keep me at morning,

Keep me at noon,

On rough course faring,

Help and safeguard

My means this night.

I am tired, astray, and stumbling,

Shield me from snare and sin.

Ancient Celtic prayer collected by Alexander Carmichael (1832-1912), published in Carmina Gadelica (Edinburgh: Floris Books, 1992). These are prayers, hymns, and incantations collected in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland in the 18th century.

Mystical Verse Rumi

When we talk about the witness in our verse, 
we talk about you.
A pure heart and a noble demeanor
cannot compete with your radiant face.
They will ask you 
what you have produced.
Say to them,
except for Love, 
what else can a Lover produce? 

~Rumi
Trans Shahram Shiva

 Graphic: Asha performing her signature sufi fusion dance 

Blessing for the Children

Blessing for the Children

O Thou, to whom to love and be are one,
Hear my cry for them who are more
Thine than mine.
Give each what is best for each.
I cannot tell what that is,
But Thou knowest.
I only ask Thee to love and keep them
With the loving and keeping
Thou didst show to Mary's Son and Thine.


an Irish Blessing for more blessings like this one

 graphic source

living water reprint from 2009

St Brendan (486-575)

Born in Ireland in 486 known as Saint Brendan the Navigator, he is remembered with extreme fondness for his great sea voyages, which captured the hearts and minds of the people his day and many in the ages since. The stories of his voyages read as part travelogue and part spiritual allegory. He was educated by Ita and ordained by Bishop Erc.

There is a wonderful legend of how he and his traveling companions landed on an small isle that turned out to be a great fish that waited paitently for them to complete their celibration of the Holy Euchurist. It is believed he may have made it as far as North America. He was also responsible for establishing several major monastic communities. Particularly Clonfert in Galaway where he was eventually buried.

A.W. Tozer (1897-1963)

Tozer on God & Nature

“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”

“Without doubt, the mightiest thought the mind can entertain is the thought of God, and the weightiest word in any language is its word for God.”

“The fact of God is necessary for the fact of man. Think God away and man has no ground of existence.”

 “The created world is to be prized for its usefulness, loved for its beauty and esteemed as the gift of God to His children. Love of natural beauty which has been the source of so much pure music, poetry and art is a good and desirable thing. Though the unregenerate soul is likely to enjoy nature for its own sake and ignore the God whose gift it is, there is nothing to prevent an enlightened Christian who loves God supremely from loving all things for God’s dear sake.”

~ A.W. Tozer, The Set of The Sail

God knows instantly and effortlessly all matter and all matters, all mind and every mind, all spirit and all spirits, all being and every being, all creaturehood and all creatures, every plurality and all pluralities, all law and every law, all relations, all causes, all thoughts, all mysteries, all enigmas, all feeling, all desires, every unuttered secret, all thrones and dominions, all personalities, all things visible and invisible in heaven and in earth, motion, space, time, life, death, good, evil, heaven, and hell.”

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Prayer to the Trinty

I am bending my knee

In the eye of the Father who created me, 

In the eye of the Son who purchased me, 

In the eye of the Spirit who cleansed me, 

    In friendship and affection. 

Through Thine own Anointed One, O God, 

Bestow upon us fullness in our need, 

    Love towards God, 

    The affection of God, 

    The smile of God, 

    The wisdom of God, 

    The grace of God, 

    The fear of God, 

    And the will of God,

To do on the world of the Three, 

As angels and saints

Do in heaven; 

     Each shade and light, 

     Each day and night, 

     Each time in kindness, 

     Give Thou us Thy Spirit.

Prayer from the Gaelic

 living water from an ancient well reprint from 2009

Beltaine (5)

THE BELTANE BLESSING

BLESS, O Threefold true and bountiful,
Myself, my spouse, and my children,
My tender children and their beloved mother at their head.
On the fragrant plain, on the gay mountain sheiling,
     On the fragrant plain, on the gay mountain sheiling.

Everything within my dwelling or in my possession,
All kine and crops, all flocks and corn,
From Hallow Eve to Beltane Eve,
With goodly progress and gentle blessing,
From sea to sea, and every river mouth,
     From wave to wave, and base of waterfall.

Be the Three Persons taking possession of all to me belonging,
Be the sure Trinity protecting me in truth;
Oh! satisfy my soul in the words of Paul,
And shield my loved ones beneath the wing of Thy glory,
     Shield my loved ones beneath the wing of Thy glory.

Bless everything and every one,
Of this little household by my side;

Place the cross of Christ on us with the power of love,
Till we see the land of joy,
     Till we see the land of joy,

What time the kine shall forsake the stalls,
What time the sheep shall forsake the folds,
What time the goats shall ascend to the mount of mist,
May the tending of the Triune follow them,
     May the tending of the Triune follow them.

Thou Being who didst create me at the beginning,
Listen and attend me as I bend the knee to Thee,
Morning and evening as is becoming in me,
In Thine own presence, O God of life,
     In Thine own presence, O God of life.

Carmina Gadelica, Volume 1, by Alexander Carmicheal, [1900]