Rituals

I make deep bows
and prostrations before You,
Lord of heaven and earth
and of all creation visible and invisible.
I cross myself
and light candles before Your icon,
and I plead for Your forgiveness.
I ask for Your grace and Your guiding hand.
But all my prayers are in vain
if I see them as a ritual,
as something I say and do
in hopes of betterment in life

Without faith and humility at heart
my prayer is a clanging cymbal,
a morning and evening exercise,
useless and unfruitful,
self deceptive and damaging to soul.

It wasn’t his fasting, his tithes,
his prayers, even his outward posterity
that sent him home unjustified,
but the disposition of his heart
in the presence of the other
who recognized himself for who he was
and begged the Lord for mercy.

Protect me, O Lord
from blind and faithless rituals.
Bring about the steadiness of mind
and an outpour of humility from heart.
Uphold my prayer and make it honest
such that everything I say and do
before Your holy icon
is receptive to Your ears
and salvific to my soul.
Amen