death of a prayer meeting

8/7/2019 Death Of A Prayer Meeting

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Death of a Prayer MeetingOnce upon a time (1971 ?) a group of people came together in Christ the King Chapel on the campus of theCollege of Steubenville (now known as Franciscan University) to worship God via the gifts of the Holy Spirit.Charismatic Renewal had come to the Catholic Church at Duquesne University in 1967. Prayer Meetings werespringing up everywhere in the early 1970s. The "Jesus" movement had been growing throughout the 60s invarious fringe elements mostly among young people. Now it had burst its way into the mainline Churches andonto the campus of a Catholic College along the Ohio River.The Prayer Meetings on Thursday nights at the College of Steubenville would start small and quickly growlarger. People from miles around would come to experience the inspired worship, teachings and prophecies.They would pray over each other for healing, cry together, and leave in groups to share together over coffee andlate night dinners. At its peak, there were 500 people coming every week in the mid 1970s.This is a story of how good people with the belief they were listening to God murdered that Prayer Meeting.I never planned, wanted or dreamed I would EVER go to anything called a Prayer Meeting. I was just 18 andfreshly out of High School. In a fit of independence I had moved out of my parent's home so that I could enjoymy freedom. So it was I was sitting on the porch of my new home bored to death with nothing to do when anacquaintance from our parish rolled up in his car. Leaning over and out the passenger window he says, "HeyJohn! Want to go to a Prayer Meeting?"I had never been to a prayer meeting -had no idea what even happened there except for the obvious- and thatidea seemed like a horrible waste of my already wasted time. I was agnostic in those days even though I playedguitar at two liturgies every Sunday morning at St Als. I loved playing and singing with the people whoprovided the music. With my musician friend Slicky -in between liturgies- I would wander into the emptysacristy to munch on some un-transubstantiated communion wafers. It was a very happy time.So when this friend asked me to go with him to a "prayer meeting", I made a hasty excuse: "Not tonight. .. Ihave plans. Maybe next week?""Sure!" said my nemesis, "I'll swing by next week."And so he left happy that I might go next week while I sighed at having dodged a bullet called a "prayermeeting." Silently I vowed to be any place else but right where I was sitting next week. And of course thefollowing week there I was -in the exact same place I had been the week before- when this same, prayer-meeting-recruitment-machine rolled up about the same time with a big, big grin on his face.It therefore came to pass that I attended my first prayer meeting ... having no idea what it was I was about toexperience. I grabbed my guitar at the last minute and so was able to play along with the folks leading themusic. It was a small group ... maybe 40 people tops ... but they could sing. And after several songs that wenton for 20 minutes or so, the entire group slid into glossolalia ("speaking/singing in tongues") ... and I literallythought there were angels in the room or I was in heaven. They sang together a capella in harmonies thatfloated in every direction, weaving in and out of each other like colored smoke over a blazing fire. I had neverheard singing so lovely, so enchanting, so... peace creating.


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Now I was extremely ashamed to do the verbal "free" worship thing ... where you just shouted out praises toGod in a random but enthusiastic manner. It would be 18 months before I would cave to that behavior. But thesinging in tongues had me at, "Fala hada chok haddahada sogoshnia." (That's tongues for something, I'mpretty sure.) Seriously ... it was ancient, mysterious beauty-speak of some kind. I was enamored with it. I wascoming back.And so I did ... all summer long. I didn't have a car so my recruitment guy picked me up every week. Plusthere were some cute girls who went too.About the end of August my father comes to me and asks me if I am going to college. The College ofSteubenville was just a few miles down the road and after a short discussion I agreed to go there. I packed myclothes into some boxes, grabbed my guitar and started school a few days late. That's when I had my firstexperience of a BIG Prayer Meeting.To fully participate in a prayer meeting you need to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. This was described to me asthe same experience the apostles had on Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit bestowed upon them the seven "gifts".They then spoke in tongues and became very courageous in their zeal to spread the Good News. I did all that Icould do to resist this Baptism. At times however, sitting in Christ the King Chapel with the music ministry in1975 in front of several hundred people, I felt something inside me of DIEING to express itself. The urge toparticipate was very strong but the shame and fear attached to public worship held me back. I was definitely ina bind.It was January 1975 when I was asked to join the 7 member music ministry. I was delighted to do so. TheThursday night Prayer Meeting (which called itself the Community of God's Love) began with wonderfulmusic ... sometimes loud and boisterous, sometimes sweet and somber. The music would subside and agrowing murmur of voices would take its place ... singing or chanting in the gift of ''tongues''. Finally after 20minutes of this sort of worship the chapel would fall into a deafening silence. Five hundred people in oneroom ... and not a sound to be heard. We described it as being in the presence of God. I look back and thinkthat maybe we were.Following the worship, a priest or a lay person would stand up and give a short talk about some subject that theywere inspired to speak about. Sometimes it was "open mic" night and anyone could come forward to share.Most ofthe sharing was interesting to hear. Occasionally there would be some weirdness but we all justlaughed or applauded politely. Frequently there would be times for healing, where people would receivemessages from God that someone in the group was being healed of this or that. The healings could be spiritual,physical, emotional, and/or relational. People also had demons cast out of them, though this was rarely astheatrical as it sounds. I never saw anyone levitating to the ceiling or spewing green, vomit-like fluids at fiery,wide-eyed priests. It was all very genteel, loving and kind.In August of 1975 two friends of mine who I had met at school cornered me. "John, it's time." I would haveavoided the Baptism in the Holy Spirit for years ... but they put me up against the wall and wouldn't let medown.I caved. We prayed. I gave myselfto it.There is no other way to describe it. I didn't get "overwhelmed" by God and ''taken over" by some forceoutside myself. I allowed myself to take it in, breathe it back out. The next day at work I practiced the gift of


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tongues when (hopefully) no one else was in ear shot. It was a deliberate action on my part to practicespirituality in this manner. I enjoyed it. I don't regret it. I miss it, even.The next several years I played my guitar and sang almost every Thursday night while I was at school. Wewere writing our own music by then and in 1976 the music ministry made its first vinyl record album. I couldsing and pray with the best of them. At the same time, a group of people who felt "God" calling them to bemore committed to each other formed the first "covenant" group. These were people who had been coming to -and in some cases leading- the prayer meeting for years. This small group started meeting together regularly,but apart from the Prayer meeting. They too called themselves the Community of God's Love as their desire tobe closer as a community had grown out of their participation in the Thursday night Prayer Meetings. In thefollowing article (PILGRIMAGE) Sr. Ann Shields would describe what was happening with this small group,how their energies became focused inward on their mutual, communal life. With the core members of theThursday night prayer meeting headed off to greener pastures, the end of the Thursday night prayer meetingshad begun.In that same issue of the Word of God's Love, (Vol II, No. 11) a former leader ofthe Community of God'sLove Thursday night prayer meeting and now a "Coordinator" of the covenant community, describes thechanges they have arbitrarily created in the Thursday night prayer meeting. He does this in the second article:FOCUS: PRAISE MEETING. This leader describes the prayer meeting as an "outreach" of the new, smallercovenant group. What is clear is that the prayer meeting which gave birth to the covenant community is beingmade less a place where God speaks to, ministers to and heals ALL of His People. It is now just a place for"praise" because of the vast needs of the diverse groups attending. Assuming that they are somehowresponsible to meet these needs, the covenant community leaders decrease the frequency of prayer meetings toevery other week and limit the focus to just "praise." In effect, they abandon what God built and gave to thembecause suddenly they feel responsible to meet the needs of people that God was taking care of all along.I assisted in the demise of this Prayer Meeting. I became a member of the Covenant Group. I shareresponsibility for the abandonment and death of a perfectly fine, Thursday night prayer meeting. In retrospect,what God had given me and my friends was far less work, far more nourishing and far more Divine than themonster we created for ourselves. I feel like the Israelites fleeing Egypt and lost in the desert. God gave themeverything they needed to survive and Ten Commandments to live by. They took their hunger for God andcreated a golden calf to worship made out of the most precious things they owned. God's gifts of manna andlaw were basic and sustaining. Their creation of their own god took all of value that they had and left thempoorer, diminished.I perceive the lesson in this most colossal of failures to be this: God creates beautiful gifts and lavishes them onhuman beings. Humans receive these gifts and immediately decide they can be improved upon, modified oradministrated accordingly. Man meddles too much. Man thinks he can do better. But the answers are moresimplistic and therefore more difficult for man: Accept the gifts of God for what they are, not what you thinkthey can be, or should be. Resist the urge to meddle in God's creations ... be they spiritual, physical or human.Love the creations of God as they are. Nourish them. Respect them. Leave them be as God made them.We diminish the gifts of God when we exert some perceived jurisdiction over those gifts, no matter how wellintended we may be.

John Flaherty, Grand Island, NEMarch 20, 2011


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T H E W O R D O FG O D ' S L O V E

THE NEWSLETTER OF THE COMMUNITY OF GOD'S LOVE - VOL. II, No.11 NOVEMBER,1977

PilgrimageBy Sister Ann (Betsey) Shields

Over the past two years, a numberof brothers and sisters in the Com-munity of God's Love have known acall to commit themselves more deeplyto one another, to grow in holiness oflife, to serve the body with their giftsand talents in a regular way, and tobe in an intregal part of the renewalof the Church.

Such desires led approximately 5 0of us to commit ourselves in July, 1976,to be covenant servants to the com-munity. A monthly meeting of the en-tire group was held for teaching andfellowship, We agreed to weekly resi-dential or non-residential householdmeetings for the purpose of sharingour lives and giving support and en-couragement to one another. We ac-cepted headship over our lives for pas-toral care and discernment. We sub-mitted our ministries to clear authorityso that we might learn to be servantsof. one another.

God blessed us-we suffered and wegrew. As the commitment became moreencompassing, some believed theycould no longer continue, others de-sired to lay down their lives.

By M.ay o.f 1977, sixty-one covenantservants and their children gatheredfor a weekend of prayer and discern-,ment to see -where God would haveus go.

We received teaching on:-unqualified commitment, the neces-

sary quality to build community;-living by the Word of Gad;-discernment on the alternatives

that were before us;

-how to respond to God's word andmove forward in the vision.W,e prayed and recreated, sharedvision and hope, fears and concerns.By the end of the weekend, we knewGod was doing something new withus. Each brother and sister in his/herheart had to face some serious ques-tions: (1) Am I called to build com-munity? Do I have the willingness towork to achieve the end, not pressingto close the gap between reality andexpectations? Am Iable to be flexible,try new ways, submit to authority? (2)Am I committed in di ff icul t situationsto ask myself "How am I going towork this out?", not whether I willwork this out, but How. (3) Am Iwilling to embrace a life of sacrifice,or do I seek security? (4) Have I madea choice for God and His work, or isit self-ambition? (5) God has spokenthrough prophecy in the renewal ofcoming darkness and the call to bandtogether. How am I living by thatword? What is to be my response?

Over the summer months, we mettogether every other week, exploring,sometimes painfu lly discerning God'swill for us individually and as a body.

In July 1977, we heard God call usto move on from being covenant ser-vants to the full commitment of ourlives and our children to build a cov-enant community.

Two years before, Ralph Martin hadspoken at a conference of the need tofollow God's Spirit-that God's wordtoday might be tomorrow's stumblingblock if we cling to it. We needed tobe ready to move on. Otherwise, wewould face the famine and drought ofwhich the prophet Amos spoke. (AmosR : 11).

And so, on Sunday, August 21, wegathered in the Chapel of Christ the

King at the College of Steubenville,and in the Eucharistic Liturgy, com-mitted our lives to build a covenantcommunity so that we might live asbrothers and sisters committed to ad-vance the Kingdom of God within. HisChurch.

We knew that we did not have thewisdom or resources to form our livesand the lives of our children into com-munity. We asked for assistance andagreed to submit our leadership fortorrnation to the Word of God Com-munity in Ann Arbor. As a result, wefound ourselves part of a large familyof 12 communities of brothers and sis-ters from many parts of the world whohad agreed over the past year to dothe same.

At present, we gather weekly for acommunity meeting of teaching andfellowship. Our teaching is based onthe foundational programs from AnnArbor.

Weekly, we are also committed tomeet in smaller groups for formation,direction and accountability of ourlives; for support and encouragementto grow in holiness and truth accord-ing to our state in life.

At present there are 13 marriedcouples, 9 committed celibates, bothmen and women, 11 single women, 7single men, and 20 children. Our adultage range is 22-56. We come from allwalks of life, and of the total numberof adults, 74% have been involved inthe Catholic Charismatic Renewal formore than five years.

We do not know the details of whereGod will lead us, or' what He will askof us; but we have heard His call toband our lives together NOW: to beformed as men and women of faith inthe transforming power of His love.


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Focus: Praise MeetingBy ' _The Community of God's Love has

entered a whole new phase of develop-ment in just the past few months (see"Pilgrimage" in this issue). Conse-quently, it has been necessary to re-examine the validity and effectivenessof its outreaches. The change from aweekly prayer meeting to a biweeklypraise meeting is one of the resultsof that evaluation. Let's take a littlecloser look at the shift.

. - A C o or din at or---- ro

death of a prayer meeting

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