Serenity prayer, I don’t want to offend any one but this helps me in the middle of the night.
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change
Courage to change the things I can
and Wisdom to now the difference.
MS is not an easy road but we are travelling it together but sometimes it feels very lonely! M
I love this prayer xx
If you acquire the serenity, courage, wisdom and frankly just the unwavering and relentless will to keep your chin up, why give credit for this to an element of hocus pocus?
Give yourself some credit!
Of course
[quote=“Paolo Smythe”]
If you acquire the serenity, courage, wisdom and frankly just the unwavering and relentless will to keep your chin up, why give credit for this to an element of hocus pocus?
Give yourself some credit!
[/quote] If someone gets strength/support from something like faith or even just an appreciation that, sometimes, s*** happens" why diss it as “hocus pocus”? As John Lennon said “Whatever gets you through the night”.
Yeh whatever gets anyone through is worth having and sharing, incase it might help anyone else.
No need for skittishness.
pollx
i am not dissing, being skittish or even wishing to offend anyone; people will do what they are most inclined to do and nothing i can say is likely to change that.
ultimately religion and faith in an unseen, unproven, intangible entity called a ‘god’ or ‘creator’ or any other such thing is quite simply a load of bollocks. and such needn’t be said.
i would agree that it is nice that a sense of peace or strength can be derived from such fantasy for some. but i would prefer however, to think of what potential self-empowerment might be enjoyed, if people were to look for their inner strengths, instead of bowing down to a phantom which could just as easily be charged with having given us the frightful conditions which blight us in the first place!
Very well put Paolo.
Sue
Whatever gets you through… however, I am with Paolo on this one. Having been brought up in a strict Christian household, I ‘de-converted’ a long while ago (20 years?) and now call myself an atheist. Technically agnostic, as there’s not much way of proving a negative, but essentially I don’t believe in ‘higher powers’. Science, logic and evidence will do for me, thanks. And all the cr*p since my diagnosis in 2013 hasn’t changed my mind one little bit. If there is a god, I have no wish to know him!
I am a non believer and have my own opinions on what religion does to this world but have no problem with anyone else’s beliefs and hope that it helps them through this awful disability.
Hi
It can be a hard prayer to pray this one, but can help bring a sense of peace
(And Paolo, I can’t help but think that if you don’t want to dis or offend people, then it’s probably best not to dismiss what someone finds helpful as ‘bollocks’ . But if you’ve ever been hurt or judged by people within the church then I can only say sorry. People have done appalling things down the ages mistakenly in the name of God (including saying that he gave us this illness, which I wholly reject), and it’s a tragedy. Like Ghandi said of Christianity, I like your Jesus, but I don’t like your Christians; they’re so unlike Jesus. (And for what it’s worth, I see no contradiction in giving my God credit for what I’ve achieved, and also feeling a sense of empowerment because of those achievements.))
Dan
Not wanting to offend in any way but, may peace be with you. And, in the words of a famous comedian, (May your God go with you).
Inner peace can be found within nonreligious and religious folks alike. It depends on how you define religion. Please don’t dismiss how we humans can find a calmness and serenity.
Anne
PS I’m an agnostic.
I love the prayer and believe that each person has the right to believe and have faith in whatever they like.
Without faith where would we be. When a specialist says you have ms or another condition you have faith that he is right and often with little evidence. The evidence could mean so many things yet we chose to believe in what we are been fed.
The same is the belief in a higher power, some people do have evidence of its exsistance others chose to believe with no evidence.
Surely that is our right to believe and not be mocked for it.
Religion does not cause wars or problems…its people that do that.
Well said and fair play to you for saying exactly what I was thinking. My faith is very personal to me and I could not be without it.
Marydan x
Without wanting us all to have a big faith versus atheism fight, I can’t help but agree with Paolo. There is no evidence for a ‘higher power’. Whatever people may choose to believe is up to them, but having faith surely means believing in something without the need for evidence.
Personally I feel that religions are in fact what cause wars. An individual person may have a faith, or belief without causing a row let alone a war. However, wars have been caused through the ages by people who choose to believe in one religion to the absolute exclusion of another. It’s only once you take faith and develop it into a religion that wars are started, this is what caused the crusades back in the Middle Ages, and this is what causes wars today. Even wars between different variants of the same religion.
Having said that, the original ‘serenity’ prayer idea is comforting for many people and I don’t want to diss that.
Sue
My conscience is my God and not something I feel the need to outsource. Each to their own though.
For the Atheists
Lord, give me Coffee to change the things i can change
And wine to accept the things i can’t 
Jemma x