Roll Over Menno

This July, children in the workshops during the Mennonite Church Canada Summit 2008 were taught how to make and use prayer beads.

Here is a brief history of prayer beads:

Prayer Beads

Roman Catholic: European catholics began using prayer beads in the 7th century AD. Gertrude of Nivelles, 626-659 AD; her body was found with a fragment of a rosary in a tomb in Belgium. Twelfth century AD, beads were found in the graves of Norbert in France and Rosalia of Palermo, Sicily. The infamous Lady Godiva, died in 1040 AD at Coventry, England

Orthodox Christian:Prayer Rope used by Orthodox, Greek Orthodox and other Orthodox Christian groups. A series of 33, 50 or 100 knots in a wool or cotton rope, anchored by a cross at one end. Wooden beads or beads of another material often are used as guide markers on the rope.
In the 11th century, church bureaucracy decided rosaries were better used for counting devotions than as superstitious pagan talismans.

Those who were unschooled in the original biblical languages Greek, Chalde, Hebrew, Aramaic; or Latin like the Romans; or were illiterate, unable to read were assigned prayers to memorize and repeat on rosaries.

Rosaries and prayer beads were intended by the Catholic Church hierarchy, cardinals, bishops and priests, for use by the ignorant.

Repeating the prayer is meant to help a person focus on the presence of God and what God is trying to say to him.

(Source: http://www.newsfinder.org/site/more/prayer_beads/)

Here is what Mennonite children were taught about prayer beads at the Summit this July (you can go to the PDF’s to read it for yourself):

About the 33 beads:

Counting Prayer Beads

Each prayer bead bracelet contains 33 beads – one for each year that Jesus lived on earth. Within these 33 beads are beads of different sizes and grouped in different numbers which symbolize other aspects of our faith…

During the Children’s Assembly, kids will make bracelet-sized prayer beads…In Deuteronomy 6:6-8, Israelites are reminded to keep God’s commandments in their hearts, to “bind them as a sign on your hand.” Prayer beads, an old prayer practice tool, can serve as reminders of God’s faithfulness – and it’s all in the numbers of beads. Stay tuned to fin out how counting beads can remind you to count on God.

Here:
www.mennonitechurch.ca/resourcecentre/FileDownload/9441/CrossroadsCurrent7th.pdf
and here:
www.mennonitechurch.ca/files/events/summit08/CrossroadsCurrent7th.pdf

About the 4 beads:

Four groups of seven beads are divided into sections by larger beads. These four beads are positioned at the top, bottom, left and right of the bracelet, reminding us of the four points of the cross.

Here:
www.mennonitechurch.ca/files/events/summit08/CrossroadsCurrent10th.pdf

About how two pray with the beads…

After circling the bracelet of beads, prayer ends on the cross directly below the “invitations to praise” bead. The cross reminds us of the prayer that Jesus taught us.

Here:
www.mennonitechurch.ca/files/events/summit08/CrossroadsCurrent10thFinal.pdf

These symbolic prayer beads sound very similar to this:
http://www.fullcirclebeads.com/symbolism.html

Here is some more enlightening information regarding the 33 beads, the 4 beads and the cross which the children were taught about at the Mennonite Summit:

Prayer beads an ancient devotion – Spirituality

Prayer beads originally were devised to help people to keep track of repetitive devotions. They enabled one to pray while doing routine jobs and between activities. In the very earliest times, prayers were marked by dropping little pebbles one by one on the ground.

About 500 years before Christ, people tied knots in strings. Primitive forms of prayer beads were made of fruit pits, dried berries, pieces of bone, and hardened clay. The wealthy used precious stones and jewels.

St. Dominic is a latecomer to the scene. The Western Church picked up on the idea in 1213 when parts of Europe were devastated by the crusade against the Albigensian heresy. According to tradition, Dominic sought the help of Mary, who instructed him in a dream to preach the rosary, as an antidote to sin. The word, rosary, comes from the Latin word rosarium, which means wreath or chaplet of roses.

By Dominic’s time, other spiritual traditions were already well grounded in their own prayer bead practices. The Hindu religion has had prayer beads for a long time. Its rosary consists of 109 beads–108 to mark the 108 names of God and one to mark the beginning of the prayer cycle, “Dancing Shiva, who shows grace, peace and creative power, and destroys and treads on the evil dwarf.”

Sakyamuni, the East Indian who was the founder of Buddhism, was well grounded in prayer beads. On one occasion, he gave a distraught king a spiritual practice based on his Hindu heritage. He directed Vaidunya to thread 108 seeds of the Bodhi tree on a string, and while passing them through his fingers to repeat, “Hail to the Buddha, the darhma (teaching) and the sangha (community).

Another interpretation of this Sanskrit prayer is translated as “Hail to the jewel in the heart of the lotus (compassion).” Repeating the mantra on each of the mala’s 108 beads serves to drive away evil “filling you and all other beings with peace and bliss.”

Islam also has its prayer beads, called tasbih or subhah. The 33-bead strand, repeated three times, honors the 99 “beautiful names of Allah” (the One Unity or God). Some of these names, or Wazifas, include Mercy, Compassion, Opener of the Way, Lover and Beloved.

The Anglican Church created its own rosary in the 1980s. It also has 33 beads, remembering the years Christ lived. The rosary is grouped in sevens and is based on Incarnational theology, starting with the cross. Four sets of beads represent the seven days of creation, seven days in a week, and seven seasons of the church year. They are divided by four large cruciform beads representing the centrality of the cross.

Source:(http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1141/is_7_39/ai_95632004)

How unfortunate that instead of teaching Bible stories to the children, Mennonite Church Canada is introducing them to this ancient repetitive practice of praying the rosary, which has been such a big part of the religious system that Menno Simons renounced.

ROM Index: 33 and counting

NOTE: UPDATE: 12:00 pm JULY 5
DUE TO A NEW DEVELOPMENT, THIS BLOG POST IS GOING TO BE REVISED SHORTLY - ASAP.

Update 4:30 pm
THIS BLOG POST HAS BEEN UPDATED. THE ORIGINAL POST REMAINS IN ITS ORIGINAL FORM. Scroll down for the update.
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The following is from an article in Canadian Christianity by Rob Des Cotes about prayer:

The shaping power of prayer
Rob Des Cotes

“…there is a particular ’shape’ that prayer requires from us in order to travel through it. There are laws of spirit - dynamics that we must conform to if we want to enter the atmosphere of prayer. Jesus once used the metaphor of passing through the eye of a needle for those who would seek to enter the kingdom of heaven.

Not every shape is capable of passing through such a particular opening. But those who, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, continue to seek passage towards God will gradually find themselves conformed to the shape of Christ with a humility and righteousness that this particular ‘gate’ requires.

Our regular practice of prayer is the most direct sculptor of our spiritual formation. The very nature of the Divine-human relationship that it represents forces us to become smaller, more humble, more receptive in order to be rightly related to its summons.

To pray according to the Spirit, we must learn to let go of our own design preferences in favour of the demands the spiritual environment we wish to enter will inevitably place on us. As we assume the shape dictated by the Creator’s hands we will be transformed into that which conforms perfectly with what we were ultimately designed for - relationship, in form and essence, with God. Like thread that has been brought to a fine point in order to fit through the eye of a needle, prayer and the life of faith fit us more and more perfectly for heaven’s gate.”

This article may be read here:
http://www.canadianchristianity.com/christianliving/080626work.html

Is this true? Is this what the Bible teaches us about prayer? What else does Rob Des Cotes teach about prayer? If the community he directs is any indication, it is a mixture of contemplative spirituality and interfaith mysticism.

Rob Des Cotes is a spiritual director and pastor of Fairview Baptist Church in Vancouver, B.C. He is a graduate of Regent College who teaches Contemplative Traditions at Trinity Western University, as well as courses on spirituality and the arts at Carey Theological College and Columbia Bible College.

He is also the director of Imago Dei, a network/ministry that is formed around the principles of spiritual direction. Imago Dei is affiliated with the Mennonite Brethren denomination of BC., as can be seen on the list of BC Conference of Mennonite Brethren churches here:
http://www.bcmb.org/qry/page.taf?id=72

Here is the puzzling part. The mission of the BC Conference of MB churches is this:

“Glorifying God by working together to build healthy churches.”

But there is a huge problem with this statement, as you will soon see. Since Imago Dei is founded on spiritual direction and community, and not on the gospel of Jesus Christ and the Word of God, they are pointing people to error instead of the truth. For example, on Imago Dei’s ‘Spiritual Direction’ page you will find the following recommendation for those who are seeking spiritual direction but live outside of the area.

“If you live elsewhere, we would recommend Spiritual Directors International (www.sdiworld.org) as a good resource to find a qualified spiritual director in your area.”

But is SDI truly a ‘good resource’ to be recommending to Christians or even those who are searching for answers?

Last year SDI, who Imago Dei recommends, had an ‘outreach’ event in Vancouver (Richmond, B.C.) called Coming Home to the Cosmos.

This is what they sang/prayed at the Spiritual Directors International, Richmond BC 2007 outreach called “Coming Home to the Cosmos“:

Sunday’s opening prayer:

Come dance with us, O Laughing Light
Bind our broken places in your scarves of brilliant hue
Whirl us into Joy
Sing us into Sound
Speak us into Words, endless yet one

O Cosmic Fire, even as this Sacred Circle begins to slowly close,
We ask you to open our hearts.

Open our hearts one more time
To receive your gifts
To drink in your grace
To spill over in your ever-flowing love

Holy One, this has been a Welcome Home.
Open the door once more
And we shall enter in
With joy.

And this is what was taught at the 2007 SDI “Coming Home to the Cosmos” Conference (to name just a few workshops - see here for more):

Ignatian Spiritual Exercises & Environment Joseph A. Bracken, S.J.

Sufi Mystical Psychology Robert Frager, Ph.D.

Exile and Homecoming in Thomas Merton Rev. Don Grayston, Ph.D.

Canku Wakan: First Nations’ Cosmology Rev. Tim Iisstowanohpataakiiwa

The Promise of Interfaith Spiritual Direction T. Falcon, D. Mackenzie, J. Rahman

This is what the Sufi Mystical Psychology teaching looked like:

Explore two interrelated Sufi models of spiritual psychology and implications for spiritual direction. “Transformation of the self” includes work with a sheikh (or guide) remembrance, and service. “Inner evolution” looks at gifts of each soul and how to balance the energies and motivations of our seven souls. 70%, 20%, 10%. Robert Frager, PhD, Director of the Spiritual Guidance program at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, USA, a sheikh or Sufi spiritual guide for over twenty years.

And here was an ad for the SDI conference (found here):

CANADA

PLACE: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

TIME: April 13-15, 2007

DESCRIPTION: Spiritual Directors International will hold its annual Conference in Vancouver, BC, CAN, April 13-15, 2007. Keynote presenter / cosmologist, Dr. Brian Swimme, will focus on the theme of “Coming Home to the Cosmos.” The conference is open to anyone interested in the ministry of Spiritual Direction including spiritual directors, students / interns, ministers, faculty, chaplains and other spiritual care providers. Fourty-four different workshops and activities will offer everything from interfaith / multicultural dialogue to First Nations Cosmology, and Ignatian Spiritual Exercises to Tibetan Singing Bowls…

This is what Spiritual Directors International called an “outreach” - directing people to a sheikh to learn Sufism (Islamic mysticism), meditating the Thomas Merton and Ignatius Loyola way, praying to the Cosmic Fire and Sacred Circle of native spirituality, and learning to use Tibetan Singing bowls? It should be obvious to any Bible believing Christian (let alone an MB affliatiated church) that SDI is an interfaith/interspiritual organization and a spiritually dangerous place to recommend to anyone for spiritual direction.

Yet this organization is a what Imago Dei considers as a good resource for spiritual direction?

Is this what the BC Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches calls “working together to build healthy churches”?

Perhaps it is time for the Mennonites in the BC MB Conference to grow some spines so they can get up from their comfy chairs of compromise and complacency and demand some accountability.

ROM: HIGH (like the pitch of a Tibetan Singing bowl)

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UPDATE:

Rob Des Cotes commented today regarding this blog post. He is correct in saying that this blog post was mostly about SDI and its interspirituality. The main issue was that the BC MB Conference would allow one of their churches to promoted SDI. The good news is that Rob Des Cotes has informed ROM that the SDI link has been completely removed from the Imago Dei website.

One of the things that needs to be cleared up is this. Rob Des Cotes stated of this blog author: “Imago Dei is not based on “inter-faith mysticism” as he falsely charges, but on “the principles of spiritual direction” as he rightly notes.”

While this blog author did not state that Imago Dei is based on inter-faith mysticism, as can be seen by rereading the original post, if one were to browse the Imago Dei website, it would be very difficult to prove that it is not based on interfaith mysticism.

Imago Dei may have removed the link to SDI (and that is wonderful), but consider the following facts:

These are some of the things you will still find at Imago Dei which were not mentioned in the original post:

-Awareness Examen of Ignatius Loyola
-Lectio Divina
-Contemplative liturgies (and/or multiple quotes, articles, prayers and excerpts) by the following contemplative mystics:

Thomas Merton (mystic, interspiritualist, see here)

Henri Nouwen (contemplative who didn’t believe Jesus was the only way, see here)

Madam Jeanne Guyon (Catholic Mystic, see here)

Julian of Norwich

Jeff Imbach (contemplative, Jesuit spirituality)

Richard Rohr (Fransciscan monk and Catholic priest, founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation where he recently presented the Jesus and Buddha Awakening Seminar, see here: http://www.cacradicalgrace.org/ )

St. John of the Cross - Dark Night of the Soul (Spanish mystic who the Catholic church named a feast after, see here)

St. Teresa Avila (Spanish mystic who levitated, see here and here)

Evelyn Underhill (had occult mysticism connections)

William Barry S.J. (Jesuit priest: http://www.campioncenter.org/staff/barry.htm)

The Practice of the Presence of God, Brother Lawrence (contemplative monk)

James Houston (contemplative)

Blaise Pascal

Meister Eckhart

Brother Roger of Taize

Thomas Keating (Catholic monk, father of Centering Prayer, based on Buddhis/Hindu/Catholic/Eastern meditative practices, he often shares the platform with New Ager Ken Wilber, see here)

Centering prayer by Fr. Basil Pennington (Catholic monk who teaches Eastern techniques through centering prayer)

St. Ignatius (founded the Jesuits)

The link to SDI may not be on Imago Dei anymore, but there are still links on Imago Dei to the following:

-Loyola House, a Jesuit Retreat and Training Centre (where you can click on Sacred Space and either pray with the pope or do an on-line meditation, OR sign up for their retreat next month called Mysticism of Earth: An Ignatian Ecology Retreat which looks like an earth worship primer where people learn to pray for garbage and the 15 billion year history of the universe)

-Soul Stream (contemplative/Merton/Nouwen/Jesuit, see here)

-Taize (ecumenical place in France where people go to chant and have community with the monks, see here)

I could go on but as you can see, we are no better off than before Rob Des Cotes wrote to say that Imago Dei is not based on interfaith mysticsm.

From these facts, would it be incorrect to conclude that Imago Dei is indeed based on interfaith mysticism? Even if they have removed the SDI link, are they still pointing people to error or to truth? Has this blog maligned Rob Des Cotes or Imago Dei if they are the ones who are promoting these things? Is this truly Christ centered, Biblical work? Is a public ministry and website, promoted by a public Conference of Mennonite Brethren churches website open to public examination? Do people who give money to the MB Conference have a right to ask questions and demand accountability? Has this blog “left an uneducated opinion” of the work Imago Dei is doing? Does this go against the things that Menno Simons himself renounced? Would this still make Menno roll over in his grave? The readers of this blog can make their own decisions on these issues. It would be very good to hear from them to help clear things up.

As far as the first excerpt from the Canadian Christianity article by Rob Des Cotes goes, if anyone wishes to discuss the concepts he has written, feel free to contact him. He seems like a very nice person who is open to discussion. However, the author and adminstrator of Roll Over Menno feel that the teachings of Imago Dei are contrary to what the Mennonite Brethren church should be promoting and do not wish to discuss this any further. Because this blog has a small readership, this blog post probably won’t make much of a ripple in the Mennonite puddle, but please feel free to leave your comments below.

How many post-modern Mennonites who have grown up in the MB denomination realize that the Mennonite Brethren church began because of an awakening and revival of spiritual life in the 1800’s?

(…) 2. The Beginning of the Mennonite Brethren Church. As the groups of Brethren increased and became more united, they raised objections to certain practices and inconsistencies of conduct on the part of members of the church and insisted on church discipline. Since this was not carried out as they believed that it should be done, they requested that communion service be administered to them separately. This the church elders declined to do. Thereupon a group of the Brethren met in December 1859 and held a communion service among themselves. This event soon became known and caused a great turmoil in the church. Some of the Brethren were called before the church and were asked to apologize and to promise that they would refrain from this in the future. They, however, did not concede to this, but rather justified their action and claimed Scriptural ground for the step they had taken. Thereupon six members of the Gnadenfeld church were asked to withdraw from the congregation.

On 6 January 1860, a number of the Brethren met in the village of Elisabeththal, Molotschna, and took steps to form a separate church. They drew up a written statement addressed to the elders of the church, in which they declared themselves an independent church and stated their reasons for taking this step. They also stated their intention to remain within the Mennonite brotherhood of the settlement. This document was signed by 18 men. This event is regarded as the beginning of the Mennonite Brethren Church, and the 18 men as constituting the first congregation. (…)

Please read more about this here:

Mennonite Brethren Church
http://www.gameo.org/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/contents/M4639ME.html

Who are the true “brethren” in Christ? Those who deny the atonement and enter into complacency and compromise with the spirituality of this world? Or those who love Jesus and His Word enough to remain true to Him? Is it time for repentance and personal revival in the Mennonite Brethren church and seminary?

If you don’t think so, browse the following articles on this blog and read about what is making Menno Simons roll over in his grave.

See how far the Mennonite Brethren have departed from their beginnings and their faithfulness to God…

The ‘new old spirituality’ of the US Mennonite Brethren

Contemplative Mennonite Retreats

MB Herald Promoting Error

Centering Prayer and Mennonites

More Mystics in the Mennonite Seminary

MB Herald promotes book that challenges the sacrificial atonement of Christ

***Canadian MB Conference - Top Five areas of concern

***Attention Mennonite Brethren!!!

In the latest MB Herald is a review by Kevin Moore (pastor of Jamestown Church, Toronto) of a book called Mennonites dialogue on same-sex - STUMBLING TOWARD A GENUINE CONVERSATION ON HOMOSEXUALITY, a compilation of articles by Michael A. King. One of several comments on the back of this book, which can be viewed at amazon.com (here), says “God saves some of us to embrace our sexuality. God saves others to seek a different sexuality. For some of us, attempts to change can lead to hell, separating us from God. For others, change can bring a deeper relationship with God.”

Mentioned in the MB Herald book review is the following quote from Meister Eckhart by a pastor (named Nisly) whose credentials were suspended by the Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference when he decided to perform a same-sex wedding ceremony:

“True followers of Jesus are absurdly happy, totally fearless, and almost always in trouble.”!

While it is true that Christians can expect persecution and trials, is this the sort of trouble that the Bible tells us to expect? Is Mr. Nisly’s situation a godly example of being in trouble for fearlessness while defending the truth in the Bible?

Before we move on, let’s take a look at who pastor Nisly quoted:

Who is Meister Eckhart?

Meister Eckhart

Eckhart, a Dominican monk who lived in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, ranks among the great Roman Catholic mystics such as Teresa of Ávila, John of the Cross, and Julian of Norwich. Toward the end of his life Eckhart was charged (and found guilty after his death in 1327), with heresy for his mystical assertions which the Catholic Church determined had bled over into pantheism. Eckhart “believed that in every human soul there is something of the very nature of God. Here it is that the human soul meets God…. [His] doctrine of the human soul has lasted to the present, and is reaffirmed whenever one speaks of a Divine Spark within each of us.”[1] Eckhart made statements such as these, “Henceforth I shall not speak about the soul, for she has lost her name yonder in the oneness of divine essence. There she is no more called soul: she is called infinite being.” And, “She plunges into the bottomless well of the divine nature and becomes one with God that she herself would say that she is God.” Such statements not only bothered the Medieval Church but some more modern researchers have found agreements in Eckhart’s philosophy with all the major points of Hindu mystics.[2] Other scholars are not so certain about Eckhart’s pantheism but his statements certainly leave the door open for such interpretations. Yet Eckhart is considered to be one of the most important Christian mystics of the Middle Ages and both ancient and modern mysticism reflect his views. Eckhart’s Divine Spark corresponds almost directly with the teachings of Eastern Mysticism, with the difference that the Divine Spark in Christian Mysticism is defined as God who resides in every human being. –Gary Gilley, Mysticism Part 2
(http://www.svchapel.org/Resources/Articles/read_articles.asp?ID=107)

Moving on, the MB Herald article also brings to light the following questions (although readers of the book will be left in the dark):

“No definitive answers are reached, no grand proclamations emanate from its pages. It truly is a dialogue, a dialogue that needs to happen in the church in general, and among Mennonites in particular. Listen to the wonderfully provocative questions…

What if the presence of gays and lesbians in the church is neither a symptom of the church’s apostasy nor a right based on an unchangeable orientation but rather a gift of God to be received with gratitude? What if the Mennonite church sought to be faithful rather than effective? What if it discovered with joy the gifts that it has been rejecting? What if this book helped the church remember the dialogue it has said again and again we are all called to have, helped the church remember the people with whom we are called to be in dialogue, or helped us all discover the gifts of God, the grace of God, which we in the Mennonite church have all too often excluded? What if God requires mercy, not sacrifice?”

Here are some other questions to bring to light regarding this book and the MB Herald’s review:

Are the Mennonites opening Pandora’s box by getting involved in this dialogue?
Exactly why does this dialogue need to happen among Mennonites in particular?
Regardless of the issue, is there ever an option to ‘dialogue’ when it comes to truth that is found in God’s Word?
Would the truth in God’s Word shed light on the outcome of this dialogue? (For example, 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, Leviticus 18:22, or Romans 1:18-32)

Is Menno Simons rolling over in his grave?

Recommended ROM reading:

Reinventing the World
Part 2 of 3:
The Mind-Changing Dialectic Process
Training the masses to think collectively and serve a Greater Whole
by Berit Kjos
http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/Reinventing2.htm

Deceived by the Dialectic Process
http://www.crossroad.to/Quotes/brainwashing/dialectic.htm

Biblical Truth versus Consensus Thinking
http://www.crossroad.to/charts/consensus.htm

Related reading:

How same-sex marriage points to the end of the world by Janet Folger

The following article fits well with the concerns of Roll Over Menno:

Why Evangelicals are Returning to Rome
The Abandonment of Sola Scriptura as a Formal Principle
By Bob DeWaay

The February 2008 edition of Christianity Today ran a cover story about evangelicals looking to the ancient Roman Catholic Church in order to find beliefs and practices.1 What was shocking about the article was that both the author of the article and the senior managing editor of CT claim that this trip back to Rome is a good thing. Says Mark Galli the editor, “While the ancient church has captivated the evangelical imagination for some time, it hasn’t been until recently that it’s become an accepted fixture of the evangelical landscape. And this is for the good.”2 Chris Armstrong, the author of the article who promotes the trip back to the ancient church, claims that because the movement is led by such persons as “Dallas Willard, Richard Foster, and living and practicing monks and nuns,” that therefore, “they are receiving good guidance on this road from wise teachers.” This he claims shows that, “Christ is guiding the process.”3

Apparently, contemporary evangelicals have forgotten that sola scriptura (scripture alone) was the formal principle of the Reformation. Teachings and practices that could not be justified from Scripture were rejected on that principle. To endorse a trip back to these practices of ancient Roman Catholicism is to reject the principle of sola scriptura being the normative authority for the beliefs and practices of the church. In this article I will explore how modern evangelicalism has compromised the principle of sola scriptura and thus paved smoothly the road back to Rome. [...]

The rest of this excellent article can be found at this link:
http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue105.htm