The Lenten Prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian

O Lord and Master of my life, take from me the spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk.

But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant.

Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages. Amen.

8 comments:

Elise said...

This is a beautiful prayer - thank you.

It made me laugh at myself because I'm reading blogs (idle talk-present blog excepted) instead of doing stuff that needs doing (sloth) while telling myself the world is going to Hell in a hand basket (despair) and if only people would do things my way everything would be great (lust of power). All while planning to while away the rest of the morning skimming through more idle talk to prolong my sloth, deepen my despair, and increase my lust for power.

I'm going to go clean the stove.

E Hines said...

Use the microwave. No stove to clean. No sloth to despair of.

Eric Hines

Tom said...

Elise, you're welcome! I had the very same reaction.

Anonymous said...

Eric, if I send you the address, will you come clean the microwave in the primary teachers' workroom? The one in the secondary workroom is clean, but there were two chili incidents and a potato-plosion last week in the main workroom, and . . . ;)

LittleRed1

Grim said...

Use of a microwave is arguably the sin of sloth to start with.

E Hines said...

LR, not a chance. Negligence has its own penalties--and opportunities to earn your way out of other sloth (note, I do not say preemptively earn). Besides, you haven't lived until you've microwaved scrambled eggs. The eggs that ate Las Cruces....

Grim, using a microwave arguably is a ward against sloth: much preparation has to be done in advance to get the week's meals ready for microwaving on the appointed day. And the thing allows more efficient use of one's time so more work can be done in the day.

Yeah. Yeah, I'll go with that.

Eric Hines

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Damn kids don't know how to bake real bread in an outdoor clay oven.

Tom said...

What is the world coming to?