By our Deacon, Scott Taylor
This Tuesday instead of checking the news for election results, you are invited to Election Night Compline. We will begin at 8 PM, when the polls in California close, and pray together for about 15 minutes.
Compline, as many of you know, are the prayers at the end of the day, part of the Divine Office. Compline is prayed before bedtime, usually around 9 PM in a monastic community. The purpose of Compline is both to prepare one for sleep and to reflect on our final sleep in death. What happens to our spirits as we sleep? Many believe that dreams might be vessels for a form of God’s wisdom that is above or beyond conscious thought. In the ancient wisdom of Compline, we are urged to go into sleep with intention for guidance and to request nourishment as we journey toward morning.
The idea of concluding election season with Compline is to refocus our attention on God, and to know that God’s love wins. We learned a few weeks ago from Ray Suarez in a webinar, Civil Conversations in Uncivil Times, to model the way of Jesus in our life. People should know us by our love.
Bishop Michael Curry’s new book, Love is the Way: Holding on to Hope in Troubling Times, also reminds us that Jesus calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves. Bishop Curry insists that we are to be rooted in love so that we can be in relationship with each other. Jesus teaches us the way of love; he didn’t teach us the way of agreement. Above all, that love dominates our relationships.
We do not know the results of the election right now. And that is okay, because Jesus calls us to a different way of life, rooted in love. Our nation faces many problems, and we will need to work together in love, agreeing to disagree when necessary, but never compromising on the commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves.
Please join us on Election Night for Compline, letting go of our anxiety and focusing on what is eternal, God’s love for us.
Here is the Zoom link: https://us04web.zoom.us/j/75916635317?pwd=aTFsWVd5ZzF0bmZiTmptTFpSRHFSQT09
Meeting ID: 759 1663 5317
Passcode: 831375