Kything past space and time

I learned long ago prayer overcomes distance. In kything prayer, you settle down, visualize a place to be with the person you want to pray with, see them in that place with you, and then invite Jesus to join you. You can talk to Jesus on your friend’s behalf … listen to what Jesus says … see what comes up.

Sitting in the sanctuary during last year’s Good Friday vigil, I had more than an hour to sit and pray, and I sank into a deep well of silence. My mind roamed … first to my mother, who lay dying miles away … asking Jesus to just be with her and let her know she’s not alone. Then I thought, if God helps me pray across space, and my God also is unlimited by time, then I can pray across time, too.

Immediately, I was in the garden with Jesus. I saw him, praying like there’s no tomorrow. I sat nearby, asking God to help Jesus through this night, and the next day. “I won’t have the nerve to stay with him, God, so you have to. Don’t let him feel alone.”

And then my mind leapt again, to the deaf boys abused by a priest in their school. I remembered the time someone shared these words with me, and applied them to my having been abused: “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.” (Mark 9:42)

And I tell those boys – in my head, in my heart, in our souls – to believe in themselves, and their worth, and to fight back. That God knows them, is angry on their behalf, wants to make things right. I imagine standing with them, shouting “NO!”

The deep kythe fades. My eyes open. I am on full alert, vibrating with a living energy.

Just my imagination? Does it matter?

My job is to be present, and to do something about what transpires in prayer: at the very least, to keep walking through this world, looking for the ways God wants us to love, doing what we can. Because in every time and in every place, there are people who need to be loved, and who need to love.

Alleluia, amen.