Lent Musings (4 of 5)

Prayer

ecently I was asked by a friend of mine if I would come to a local park, notorious for it’s street activity, to speak and pray at a vigil that she was organizing. The vigil was both to remember women who had recently been murdered in Toronto’s sex trade as well as to stand in solidarity with each other in a peaceful protest as to the evils of this trade.

The friend who asked me to do this was a survivor of ‘the life’ herself. She had worked the trade for more than a decade until finally one night whilst in the midst of a bad trip on her favourite drug of choice, crack cocaine, she had a life changing and miraculous encounter with the Living God. She hasn’t looked back since and has committed her life to God and to journeying alongside people involved the trade. She is truly one of my heroes and a reminder to me whenever I see her that God does in fact still work and move in miraculous and life altering ways today.

I was warned before going that there would be conflicting agendas at play at this vigil. There would be people of different religious faiths present and all kinds of ’spirituality wars’ taking place. I was also told that there might be a group of advocates there whose whole premise is that the sex trade is a viable and perfectly acceptable vocational option for women to be in; as long as it is their choice as a woman to make. Despite my reservations, I accepted the invitation out of respect for my friend who had asked me to come and do this.

So when I got there, in the pouring rain I might add, I found myself one of very few men in the midst of some very strong and committed women; some of whom looked very tough and even perhaps angry. I was pretty much freaking out.

The vigil started with an aboriginal drummer and a First Nations smudging ceremony for anyone wanting to participate in that cleansing ritual. Then it was my turn to speak and pray! What on earth was I going to say that could possibly address this crowd and not do further damage to their image of Christians, of men, and of God?

Back to Lent

The 3^rd of the 4 ‘Acts of righteousness’ of Lent is prayer. (Matthew 6:5-15) Prayer is one of those many theological conversations that can get tricky really fast. “If God knows everything already, why do we need to pray? If God has a plan and it is already in motion, what difference will my prayers make? Why should I even bother?” These questions are all too familiar and are definitely important to flesh out. And I won’t even attempt to try and answer these in any thorough way. But I will say that after a lifetime of trying to figure out what it means to live as a Christian, that prayer is absolutely vital in the Christian walk. It does change things (both internally and in the world around us), and is a non-negotiable for anyone who identifies themselves as a Christian.

In the world we live in, we are exposed to constant distractions, noise, and choices. Everywhere we look, some advertiser is vying for our attention. I’ve been told that the average city dweller is exposed to at least 5000 ads per day. So all day long, from the time we wake to the time we go back to sleep, we are being bombarded by people telling us what to wear, drive, eat, think, buy, and do. How can we possibly hear the voice of God amidst all the noise?

hands As I’ve said in my first of these Lent musings, this season is a time of defragmentation. It is a time to refocus on the things that are important and to leave behind those bits and bites that have gotten stuck in the cogs our system and have jammed up our ability to process the world and our place in it. Often these little fragments of pollution make it impossible for us to even know that we are children of God and beloved by Him. So during Lent it is crucial to cut ourselves off from the noise for periods of solitude and prayer. These quiet times help us to hear the voice of God and avoid the distractions. They are times to shut out the lies being sold to us all day long and to focus on what is real and true. They are times to wake up from our sleep and oblivion to the fake world that has been created by corporations and other principalities and powers all around us and to see through the fumes to the truth. I have the awesome privilege of going to L’Arche Daybreak, the place where Henri Nouwen spent his last days, and taking retreats there whenever I can. I get to sleep in his house, hang out in his library, and reflect in silence on God, life, and the world around me. It is a gift that I could never properly express my gratitude for and one that I got to access for 2 days just last week. And I left feeling refreshed, focused and rejuvenated yet again.

That retreat reminded me that I believe in prayer. I believe in communal prayer with other believers and I believe in prayers of solitude. I believe it can be done while walking down the street of sitting on the subway or riding my bike. I believe it can be creative and spontaneous. I believe it can be powerful when read in a liturgy. And again, I believe it changes things because the God we pray to is the Creator and Preserver of all things. God is the Great Physician and can heal our world, our sicknesses (both physical and emotional), and our complacency.

I’ve said it better than I could write it here in this video that I did in preparation for a conference last year. So check it out if you have a few minutes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl4aIOv4Pzs

Back to the Vigil

As the drum ceremony was still underway, I silently prayed to God. Now I don’t speak this way very often, but as I prayed I felt a calmness come over me and felt as though I were being given the words to say and to pray. And while I struggled to get on track with Lent in the early weeks of the season this year, as I’ve admitted in my first post, I believe this was a turning point for me this Lenten season.

I said something like this;

“I’ve been working alongside folks who live on or close to the streets of Toronto for the past 20 years now. Back in the early days of my work, I was with a group that tried to reach out to folks who were working in the sex trade. 2 or 3 nights per week we’d go out in the middle of the night and hand out hot chocolate to women, boys and transvestites who were working the streets, in hopes of befriending them and letting them know that they are loved. We’d also hang out in all night coffee shops where women were known to take breaks in between tricks, again in hopes of somehow getting a message to them that they are loved and the beloved children of God.

It didn’t take long for me to be overwhelmed with emotions ranging from heartbreak to rage over what I experienced. The heartbreak came from getting to know some of the working girls and learning that they really didn’t have any hope of getting out of the trade, and had resigned themselves to their ‘fate’ in life. The rage came from watching men drive around in their mini-vans with their baby seats installed in the back, and picking up boys or women or transvestites in order to get their sex fix, and then heading back home to their wives and kids in the suburbs. I was also enraged with the pimps who were so horrible to ‘their girls’, and the culture we lived in which glorified the so-called profession of ‘pimp’ on TV, movies and in music. I felt helpless doing the work and I knew I needed to get out before my emotions took over and destroyed me. So I left that work behind.

Lately I ride my bike to work every morning. I currently run a shelter for men who are homeless. As I ride to work at 7am each morning, I ride through Toronto’s ‘low track’. (An area where very poor, addicted, and desperate women work the trade in hopes of snagging a john on their way to work in the morning. They often work for their next ‘hit’ of drugs.) As I ride through, I want to stop and talk. But I don’t because I don’t know how that will look to people driving by and I don’t know how the girls will respond to me if I stop. Will they think I’m another john? Will they think I’m a cop? Will they get mad at me for interrupting their business? So I keep on riding by without saying a word, just like all the other traffic. And as I ride through, I feel helpless and heartbroken.

But in the midst of my helplessness, I do not feel hopeless. I have hope that there is a way out of the life. I have hope that there is something better. And my hope rests in God, the creator and preserver of all things. The God I worship is bigger than the sex trade. He is bigger than crack cocaine. She is bigger than guns and gangs. She is bigger than pimps, bikers, and johns. He is bigger than drug dealers and organized crime. And she is able to overcome anything. My God gives me hope.

So before we go any further, let us pray to God.

Father God, I pray that you will be with us tonight and that you will make your presence known to us.

Mother God, I believe that you are here and that you know us by name. I believe that you love each of us, no matter what we have done or where we have been.

Creator God, I believe that you are a just God and that someday, while we don’t really know why you continue to let life be difficult for so many people, you will make everything right for all of creation.

So God, I cry out to you in faith and hope that you can and will make everything right, and that in the meantime you will watch over each of us and over our friends who are working the streets on this night.

I pray all of this in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ,

Amen.

Easter is just around the corner.

dion2

Writer: The Concise Oxford is written by Dion Oxford who, along with his wife, Erinn, and daughter, Cate, live in Toronto, Canada and are committed to journeying alongside people in the margins of society. He and Erinn have spent a combined 30 years working amongst folks who are living on the streets of Toronto. Dion is a recovering Salvationist who currently worships at an evangelical Anglican church but still works for The Salvation Army at the Gateway, a shelter for men experiencing homelessness. He and his wife see the solution to homelessness as the church taking seriously the two great commandments of loving God and loving our neighbour. He likes to read, write, fly kites, cycle long distances, watch TV, play in his band and hang out with his friends.