COMMUNITY SPIRIT
Book review PRAYERS FOR A PRIVILEGED PEOPLE, by Walter Brueggemann, Nashville: Abingdon Press (2008). ISBN:978-0-687-65019-4 (185 pp.) no index, Preface (15pp).
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alter Brueggemann is the son of a German Evangelical pastor, born in the mid-west (Nebraska) and educated first at Elmhurst College near Chicago and later at Eden and Union Theological Seminaries (both in New York) and at St. Louis University. He is one of the world’s leading scholars of the Old Testament. He is retired now and lives in Cincinnati. He begins this book of prayers by stating, “Prayers for a ‘privileged people’ isn’t a new idea to me, primarily because I am inordinately privileged in every way — white, male, tenured, blessed with every gift our political economy could provide.” He goes on to relate how we live in privileged environments and most of our churches “are exactly such venues of privilege” and our privilege “tends to work against openheartedness.” If we were honest, as privileged people in privileged environments, “hard issues like privilege and entitlement, injustice and violence would be on the table.” These prayers, like most prayers, are context specific and that context is our privileged lives. Brueggemann writes and prays as one of us. The first section, “Opening our Hearts: the Collect,” begins with six prayers on the words and phrases of the “Collect for Purity,” which is familiar to all Episcopalians. These are lovely insightful prayers. According to Brueggemann, entry into the presence of God depends on God’s graciousness and is to be undertaken with “great intentionality.” The words of this great Collect become more meaningful, more supportive of one’s consciousness of intentionality, and more a part of one’s inner life with each of the sequential prayers. Saying The Collect for Purity thereafter has a greater possibility of becoming an intentional act, and not a repetitious muttering. The subsequent prayers in this book, accumulated randomly over time and evoked by different circumstances are grouped under five headings: “Well-Arranged Lives,” “The World is Not Safe,” “Brick Production,” “Can We Risk It?” and “Choirs of Hope.” In these sections one can find a prayer which is appropriate for just about any human situation or experience.
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The prayers speak to us. We have been there, too. But our prayers on these occasions are not as articulate as Brueggemann’s. We can meditate on his prayers, study them, reflect on them, talk about them or simply pray them. This is a valuable collection of thoughtful prayers. I heartily recommend it for anyone who wants to seriously reflect on our life together—all of us, on this planet, at this time. — review courtesy of Barbara Bloom
Trinity Topics
April, 2011