Living Prayer Ministry: Clothed For The Days Ahead

21-Day Somatic Practice

21 consecutive live Zoom gatherings · One hour each day
with Aletheia Sophia, from Les Contes in the French Pyrenees

What would it feel like to meet the days ahead clothed in strength and dignity? To speak with wisdom and kindness when a conversation becomes difficult, to keep your footing when the world feels uncertain, and still to have room for laughter?

Some of you have already prayed this way with me in the Upper Room at Les Contes. You may remember how slowly we go. We read a passage of Scripture aloud and stay with it. Jesus looks up and sighs. A woman reaches for his garment, and he turns towards her. We give that small movement time. What does it feel like to be the person someone turns towards? And what changes when we turn that same attention towards another?

This December, I invite you to join me for twenty-one days of Living Prayer. Through prayer, gentle self-touch, movement, breath and awareness, we’ll make room for the light and eternal life of God’s Word to reach into our ordinary lives. Each day brings one distinct passage of Scripture, and each hour is complete in itself. We’ll listen for what the passage stirs within us, then ask how it might find expression in a word we speak, a decision we make or the care we offer someone.

Proverbs 31:25–26 gives us the image of a woman clothed in strength and dignity, who laughs at the days to come with wisdom and kindness on her tongue.  In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus speaks to people facing great distress and asks them to lift their heads. Both images speak to what I want us to practise together this Advent. We can learn to find steadiness in the body when life presses in, see beyond our first reaction, and draw closer to God in the middle of what is happening. We can grow a faith that holds fast because it rests in God’s faithfulness, and welcome a joy that walks with us into every day.

Three movements through Advent

• 1–7 December · Receive the Word. We’ll give Scripture time to settle in the body and see what becomes possible when we listen with our whole selves.
• 8–14 December · Put on the garments. We’ll explore what strength, dignity, wisdom and kindness feel like from within and how someone else might recognise them in the way we live.
• 15–21 December · Make room for Christ. We’ll let what we have received take form in our relationships, in the way we welcome people and in the practical care we give and receive.

What’s included

• A live, one-hour Zoom gathering each day, with Scripture, guided embodied prayer and time for silence. You can take part seated or standing.
• An instant replay of every gathering, yours to keep with no expiry.
• Journal prompts each day, drawn from that day’s Scripture and practice.
• The Fellowship, our online community where you can share what you’re experiencing, bring a question that has stayed with you, or tell us how a word from the morning’s prayer met you later in the day.

I would love to share these candlelight December days with you.

With love,
Aletheia