Dr. Stewart Bitkoff: Live Interview on Progressive Radio Network

it came to me today that the prayer of Submission in your recent book about Sufism for the Western Seeker and WHY the it seemed so familiar.

For one thing it reminded me of a prayer i was taught in Roman Catholicism as a child:
“Dear Father in heaven, i give you today,
and all that i think and do and say,
let it be united with what was done,
by Jesus Christ your dearest Son, Amen”

Being trained as an addictions counselor, now retired and disabled, it also reminded me of the famous 12 step recovery fellowships, started with the first one; Alcoholics Anonymous.

These fellowships are used for everything from losing weight and keeping it off or to stop smoking or to deal with chronic debt, to serious alcoholism, drug addiction, gambling, violence and so on, that can land people permanently homeless or in jail or dead, and do it very quickly sometimes.It is even used by folks who are effected in toxic ways by people with any of the above types of problems- and much, much, more. There are literally hundreds of these fellowships. It is used for sexual (selfish and harmful) addictions, as well as codependents of those with these types of addictions, who let them do it and get away with it (SLAA and COSA) to those who are overcoming the effects of such sexual addiction when it becomes abusive (Survivors of Incest Anonymous or S.I.A). The latter addiction to selfish and harmful sex. bringing down many famous people these days, causing them to become infamous!

And the 11th of their 12 steps go like this: “Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understand Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry it out” (copyright AA GSO, NY, NY, USA)

It also reminds me of a prayer that is not limited to use by said 12 step groups, but is widely used, in part, by them – and it is famous all over the world, or at least the English speaking part of the world. It says: “God grant me (us) the serenity to accept the things we can not change, the courage to change the things we can and the wisdom to know the difference, Amen”. The idea of acceptance as being the solution to the problems that leads folks to work step-recovery, is absolutely huge. Both this and the 11 step cited above remind me of the Sufi prayer of submission in your book.

And the fact that it actually works miracles in the lives of those plagued by such problems as i have listed and many others, as well as the fact that it is working in the lives of millions of people to improve the quality of their every day lives, with these practical problems and just about anything else one can think of, would seem to be a powerful point in favor of the submission/acceptance idea – i.e. surrender, to put it bluntly. So I would say that this is an idea which has already been proven and that it’s time has come for practitioners of any and all faiths, as well as those who practice none.

Just some thoughts from a different point of view.

j/L “Granny” Matrika p.s. if you wish to post this on your blog and/or as a review of your book, please feel free to do so!

matrika52Agmail.com, Granny Matrika
posted by SB

Reply