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Taking a Look at Different Spiritual Disciplines

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Spiritual Disciplines
In my given faith exposure to the Spiritual Disciplines was rather limited; there was fasting that we did during Lent, and prayer that was for a lack of a better term, scripted. Intercessory prayers were made mostly to the venerated saints instead of directly to Jesus Christ. In fact, two of the most common intercessory prayers I said to the saints were to St. Jude, the Patron Saint of Hopelessness and St. Michael, the Archangel, who is the Patron Saint and protector of those in public safety. For many years it was understood that if you needed something in prayer, you prayed to the appropriate saint in ritualistic prayer. As I mentioned fasting was associated with Lent and during the Lenten season your fast was to give up something you were attached to and of course meat on Fridays. Once Lent was over so was your fasting. Even worship is termed differently and is more commonly known as duty or Liturgy ("Liturgy definition," n.d., para. 1). Unfortunately, this sense of duty removes the sense of worship that involves our whole being (Foster, 1998, p. 169). When worship is turned into duty instead of something you freely want to do, it is no wonder that people turn away from corporate worship.
Certainly, I knew of these disciplines but their purpose was never really understood and truly, I never knew they were disciplines. To my relief it was discovered that my generation and many others were left in ignorance of the most simple and practical
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