Contemplative Christian

Tonight, in the fading light of early winter, my son babbled himself to sleep as I sat in prayer next to his crib. I found myself breathing audibly, in and out, exhaling in the “shhh” sound every parent used to soothe babies. My thoughts drifted to a workshop I attended recently, where a local Sufi group demonstrated a breathing prayer. Two breaths in through the nose, representing a welcoming of the Spirit of God, and a long exhale through the mouth, representing a voiding of the world and flesh. My breaths became a prayer…”shhhhhh”…Jesus, Come…”shhhhhh”…Jesus, Come.

Richard Rohr writes of an ancient Jewish tradition regarding the name Yahweh, the name of God revered such that it was never spoken out loud. Rohr tells of how this word Yahweh actually represents the act of breathing…it can’t be voiced, because it is breath itself.  The name of God, breathed…in and out…Yah….Weh…a beautiful thing to consider. And I did consider it, as I sat in the dark listening to the breath of my infant son. God is that close…as close to us as our breath. Christ resides in me, as close to me as my breath…as natural as my breath…as tied to my very life as my breath.

What if prayer were as simple as the act of breathing?  What if we are so hard-wired to communion with God, that breathing…taken so for granted…represents the simplest of realities: that God is with us, breathing for us and in us, and we in Him, even when we’re not thinking about it?  Lord, let me recognize the every-moment gift of this God-breathed life…

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