For Parents 01: Sitting Quietly With God
"They key," Dr. Brian Russell tells Sunday Schooled, "is to create a core of deep faith that centers the family."
It might come up suddenly during a car ride home, a topic in the news I’m asked about—but don’t know enough about. Or it might be a longstanding concern that I’m struggling to understand how to engage. Whatever it is, there’s lots of times parents, educators, and community leaders wish we had more information. But especially for Muslim parents, there just aren’t that many resources out there to help us out.
Which is where Sunday Schooled for Parents comes in. The subject changes from week to week. But the goal always remains the same: I talk to smart people to learn how to explore important subjects to the kids in our lives. If you’re entirely new to Sunday Schooled, you might want to start here first, with what I write—and why. To sum it up: To help us raise kids who love and live their faith.
Close Out Ramadan With The Sound of Nothing At All: Dr. Brian Russell’s Journey Closer and Closer to God
A few weeks ago, the podcast algorithms suggested an episode of Midnight Theology—which I’d never listened to before—featuring Dr. Brian Russell, Professor of Biblical Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary. He was on to talk about his latest book, Centering Prayer: Sitting Quietly in God’s Presence Can Change Your Life. I listened and immediately knew I wanted and needed to know more.
When I cracked open the book, this line, early in the introduction, jumped out at me:
For too long, the God I’ve worshiped has been more a construct in my mind than the lover of my soul and the object of my soul’s affection.
That’s exactly how I feel about too much of my Muslim life so far. Raised to believe I had to surrender to God, but finding it hard (for silly and serious reasons) to do just that, I made up for the God-shaped hole in my life by just talking about God. Instead of to Him. I think a lot of Muslims do this. Consciously or subconsciously, we have an inkling we’re not nearly the kinds of believers we should be.
But because it’s hard (for all kinds of reasons) to roll up our sleeves and wash those forearms, we replace the practice of Islam with Islam-as-identity, or Islam-as-politics, or Islam-as-culture, or Islam-as-heritage, thinking that if we just do enough Muslimish things, we’ll make up for what deep down inside we know we’re missing. After forty, though, it got harder and harder to play that game.
It’s hard not to think a little bit more seriously about what’s ahead of me. I mean my mortality. My future in another life. But I also mean continuity. My legacy in this life. What do I owe to those who come after me?
When I told my wife that Dr. Russell was describing what I hoped for Ramadan—less talking about Islam and more practicing Islam—it set in motion a conversation that led to this, the first post in a new series. I’d already recognized how Sunday Schooled had gone off course (you can read that post here.) But I could refocus on the original objective of Sunday Schooled—teaching kids—and still add new types of stuff.
As long as that stuff served the greater purpose: To help us raise religiously confident young Muslims who will eventually make us irrelevant. (Well, sort of.) I’m conscious that a few readers might be surprised that my first guest is not a Muslim, but I trust that we all recognize the significant similarities across the great faith traditions, as well as the need to better understand other faiths where they differ.
And more importantly, with the last ten nights of Ramadan approaching, what better topic than talking to God, learning how to listen to God, and learning how to focus on God—from someone who clearly cares about, invests in, and draws on faith?
I’m so grateful to Dr. Russell for taking the time out of his very busy schedule (during a sacred season for Christians too, no less!), for helping me think about my own struggles with faith, and for being so open about how we can help kids navigate these and other challenges in rich, meaningful, and empowering ways.
What follows below is a very lightly edited transcript of our conversation.
Sunday Schooled for Parents: The Dr. Brian Russell Interview
Haroon: What is the centering prayer? And how do you do it?
Dr. Russell: Centering prayer is a type of silent meditative prayer. Your intention in centering prayer is to surrender your thoughts/feelings/sensations whenever they capture your attention during your prayer time. The goal is to sit in silence with God and perhaps to experience the real presence of God apart from your conscious thoughts. To facilitate it, you choose a short prayer word.
For Christians, I usually encourage persons to use “Jesus” or “Father” or “Spirit.” These are the central figures for the Christian understanding of God. I’m not an expert in Islamic theology, but I’d assume that it would be most helpful for a Muslim to select “Allah” or one of His titles or attributes as the prayer word. The prayer word is not a mantra that is rapidly repeated. Rather it serves as a way of breaking up our thought loops in our minds whenever we realize that we are lost in a thought.
The surrendering of our thoughts (whether they be profound and beautiful, mundane, or difficult) is our part of the prayer.
Set a time for 15-20 minutes (or even for 3–5 minutes).
Sit in a comfortable place, close your eyes, and be still.
Whenever you find yourself lost in a thought, gently return to your intention of being silent before God by using your prayer word to center you anew.
You talk about the centering prayer as emerging from ancient Christian tradition, with roots in antiquity. But in your life, the centering prayer only becomes a dedicated practice after a particularly painful period. What do you think opened you to bringing the centering prayer into your life?
Had you tried anything like it before?
I discovered centering prayer during a profoundly painful part of my life. I felt for a season that I had lost my relationship with God. My traditional spiritual practices were not helping me. But I had good friends who were well-versed in spiritual formation and they introduced me to both centering prayer and spiritual journaling. I found that the contemplative practices were precisely what my soul needed during that difficult time and I’ve been practicing ever since. I say now that I found myself in a season where I felt lost in the silence but God surprised me by engaging me out of and through the silence.
I’ve felt that for much of my life faith was a construct. I’ve often found prayer–the act of submitting and surrendering–incredibly hard. But I am trying to do things differently now. This Ramadan, I’m trying to dedicate more time to actual worship. More time talking to God.
And I’d like to share that with the kids. Of course, knowing how hard it was for me, and how much pressure there is in the current moment–socially, culturally, philosophically–pushing the other way, I’m not sure how we can meaningfully bring worship, and the idea of surrender, into our family’s practice of faith.
How do you think parents can help kids cultivate a concern for their interior spiritual lives?
Parents can cultivate a deep spiritual life in their children by encouraging their children to give voice to their feelings, anxiety, questions, guilt, fears, and shame. When we allow our children to name what is going on inside of their bodies, we are creating space to teach religious practices that actually touch these areas. We live in an era of unprecedented anxiety and depression among young people.
Deep spiritual practices such as silent meditative prayer and journaling can really help our kids to thrive and flourish in their faith and life. Of course, we need to model it for them too. My daughters were already teens before I started practicing centering prayer, but I can imagine introducing the practice to them much earlier if I had the chance to do it over.
Many times, in Muslim spaces, we treat prayer as a ritual obligation–which, in key respects, it is. But then many of us rarely travel from the external to the internal, the direct connectedness with our Creator, the uplift and refinement of our character, the change in consciousness and awareness prayer should lead us towards.
How do we move beyond rote practice without abandoning discipline?
Christians have rote prayers too. Memorized prayers connect us with others who are praying the same way at the same time. But as you say, we can sometime miss the deeper elements of a relationship with our Creator because of the ritual aspect.
Here are some practices that help me:
I try to force myself to slow down when I do the rote prayers so that I can connect with the words themselves. I try to focus on the meaning of the words of the prayers and not just on saying the words.
Also I attempt to find other times beyond the assigned times for prayer to offer spontaneous prayers or to sit in silence. I pray with my family before each meal and I always prayed with my daughters before school and at their bedtime.
Some people say they find all the spirituality they need in meditative and contemplative practices, which usually come absent a theological framework. How do you, as a Christian, respond to that?
I love this question.
When I teach centering prayer, I always emphasize that it is not a substitute for core Christian practices such as reading the Bible, attending worship, and praying. In fact, centering prayer is not necessary to be authentically Christian or Muslim. But it is a rich practice that can take us even deeper into the love of God and shape us to be ambassadors of God’s love to others.
The danger of any meditative practice is that it can become about our self-focused spirituality rather than about communion with God. True silent meditative prayer is about being in the loving presence of our Creator God. Thus, we must have a foundational relationship with God before beginning our practice.
A lot of people say American religiosity is in decline. Or at least the institutional and traditional versions are. Do you think that’s true–and do you think that creates any special obligations on parents of faith as a result?
The polls that I’ve seen are mixed. There is a rise in persons who do not identify with any traditional religion. It is this aspect that most headlines proclaim, and it is true. Yet buried is the reality that the number of committed believers has remained steady for the last fifty years. The implication is this: It isn’t the committed faithful who are shrinking; it is the lukewarm or only culturally committed persons who are losing religion.
Thus, long term, persons of faith need to learn to bear witness to our faith to those outside of it in ways that are inviting. But we also need to continue to nurture a deep faith in our own communities that teaches our children how to answer the challenges and obstacles to faithfulness that the surrounding culture places in our path. Additionally, your question points to the need for committed persons of all faiths to find points of common ground as means of holding a public space for a vibrant witness to the love of God and neighbor.
You’re a father who’s a faith leader. I’m someone who’s made his religion very much a part of his public identity. Some of that was by circumstance. But some of that is very much by choice. I do wonder, though, about whether that feels suffocating to those around me–if it creates expectations and impositions that children would be better off without.
Maybe it feels especially fraught because I’m a stepdad, although I suppose the fear might be there regardless of when the kids came into my life.
Did you or do you ever feel the same way?
How do you balance being a parent and a faith leader? Have you ever found the latter negatively impacted your ability to be a good dad?
And if so, how did you address that?
I was fortunate to have spiritual mentors who advised me to cultivate a family first commitment. My daughters never needed to question where my heart was. Yes, I was often the person preaching or teaching and I had to attend meetings some evenings. But when I was finished, I was dad. I tried my best to arrange my schedule to prioritize as much as possible family commitments.
Sometimes this was frustrating to my own vocational aims, but at the age of 53, I can look back and not regret spending extra time with my girls. My advice for parents is to enjoy your family while the children are young. Of course, you need to fulfill your obligations to work and your faith community, but set healthy boundaries. God didn’t invite us into His service in order to cause friction or extra hardship in our families. Of course there will be busy seasons but we need to take care that these are the exception. You will have lots of time later in life to work on your career and other goals. I’ve written a number of books now and all but one were published after my children reached high school.
You mention step-parenting. I am a stepdad too. My step children were all at least 16 years old before I came into their life. The stepparent relationship is a difficult one because we have to navigate different expectations forged in the values they learned from their previous family relationship.
It takes time, patience, forgiveness and lots of love.
In the course of your book, you mention your daughters. As someone who has become increasingly sensitive to how religious spaces, frameworks, and institutions treat women, I wonder what advice you might have for those of us who are helping to raise young women.
I grew up in a household of all men except of course for my mom. God blessed me with two daughters. My goal was to prepare them for life in the world. To this end, I encouraged them to explore their gifts and curiosities. Both of my daughters played soccer for many years. My youngest played on teams from age 5–18 and still plays pickup games at her college. Sports are great for young women.
Also I tried to model love for my wife. I wanted my daughters to see how a man should love and honor his wife (the reverse is also true but I’m writing as a man). Moreover, when my daughters were in elementary and middle school, I took each of them (often separately) on a weekly daughter-dad date. The high school years were a little trickier as they had to begin to differentiate themselves from their parents.
But now that they are college age and beyond, I’m back to spending time each week (sometimes on Zoom) with each of my daughters.
The Muslim community, like any other religious community (sadly), has been afflicted by crises of abuse, from the spiritual and financial to the sexual and emotional. How should parents of faith speak about such issues with their children?
When are children are young (pre-school and elementary school age), we simply must find ways to protect them. In my United Methodist tradition, local churches participate in a “Safe Sanctuary” program that take steps to screen any persons (clergy or volunteers) who work with children in the faith community.
As parents, we must also use age appropriate language to help our children to understand appropriate versus inappropriate interactions with adults. As they get older and they learn about scandals, I think it is wise to have frank discussions to help them to understand the presence of evil in the world (and sometimes in our faith communities) but also to help them to separate the actions of bad actors from the deeper truths about God as well as the many faithful members of our faith communities.
There’s only so much we can pass on. Only so much that’ll stick before it becomes burdensome and even resented. What about faith did you decide was most important to pass on? Looking back, do you think you’d have done anything differently?
I tried to teach my daughters the core of the Christian message as they grew: Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. I tried to model both of these postures. When my daughters were young, I read the Bible to them (focusing especially on the stories about Jesus) and also modeled a life of prayer. We always prayed at meals and at bedtime. When I travelled overnight, I’d write out personal prayers for each of my daughters to read in the morning and at night. We also worshipped together in a local church. For me these were the important elements, but let me mention again the key: I tried my best to model my faith before their eyes. I also admitted to them the times when I didn’t live up to faith values that I taught.
At different times in their lives, our kids attended Jewish, Catholic, and public schools, not to mention Islamic schools. Plus, we’re American Muslims, which means we’re a tiny minority in a country that has often perceived Muslims as foreign, if not hostile.
Our relationship to broader society and other religions comes up time and again.
But I wonder: What kind of conversations do you hear about Islam in the spaces you work, worship, and live in? (I promise you I won’t get offended.) I’d genuinely like to know what kind of sentiments are out there, what kind of perceptions exist, and whether these have changed over time, for better or worse.
My experience may be a little different from others in the United States. First of all, I live in Orlando, Florida. All of the faiths of the world are present here. I’ve met and spoken with persons from all of the major religions in the world. In terms of Muslim faith, The Islamic Society of Central Florida is less than five minutes from the seminary where I teach.
I’ve been blessed to meet and become friends with Muslim neighbors. In the multicultural area where I live, my family regularly interacts with Muslim families. In fact, my youngest daughter’s three best friends in high school were Muslim. I shop in Muslim-owned businesses. My dentist is Muslim and she wears the hijab.
In other words, when I see a Muslim man or woman or family, I don’t see them as “other” but as my neighbors.
Getting to know my daughter’s friends’ parents was a blessing and I experienced their hospitality firsthand.
In the seminary setting where I work, all of our students are encouraged to interact and attend worship services of other faiths as part of their training. One of my colleagues teaches that beside the Bible we ought to be reading the Qur’an so that we can be better neighbors to Muslim families in the United States.
Obviously, when something “bad” happens in the world and the perpetrator was of the Islamic faith, the news media often bombards us with negative images and caricatures of Islam. For me, the key for interacting with all people is this: I try to see others as people both created by God and loved deeply by God.
What are some resources that you as a parent have found invaluable?
I don’t have any specific recommendations in terms of books. I found that I gained the most help and insight from what I learned from other parents. Strive to cultivate friendships especially with parents who are a few years ahead of you.
I know it’s terrible form to ask a writer what he wants to write next, but I wonder–are there any topics, themes, or concerns you’d like to address? Or maybe I should put it broadly: What should communities of faith be spending more time thinking about, writing about, and reflecting on? What are the issues and questions we need to be more mindful of?
I’m working on two projects now. I serve as a Professor of Biblical Studies so the first project is a book on how to read the words of the Bible in ways that allow us to hear God at a deep enough level that we may be personally transformed. I’m also working on a book that details my own struggles with faith and how I’ve found a deeper connection with God through my struggles.
My wife’s a Cavs fan. More accurately, she’s a proud Ohioan who’s followed LeBron James closely, though she’d had some mixed emotions about some of his more prominent decisions. On the other hand, I’m a Lakers fan. That is momentarily convenient, what with King James making his home in southern California.
Somehow, though, our youngest is a passionate Brooklyn Nets fan. How should we address this kind of apostasy?
This is a fun question! I know you are mostly writing in jest but sports do often divide families. I remember my younger brother always rooted for the Pittsburgh Steelers whereas my dad and I loved the Cleveland Browns. It was a fun rivalry. Yet there is a good lesson here. When we permit our children to hold different ideas than we hold on issues that really don’t matter in the long run (like favorite sports teams) we are giving space for them to grow as individuals. The key is to create a core of deep faith that centers the family.
Read More (And Tell Me)
If you enjoyed this conversation, please let me know—and let me know who else you think I should be talking to. If there’s a particular topic, issue, or concern you’d love for me to explore deeply, let me know that too (there’s probably lots of other readers with similar questions.)
You can read more about Dr. Russell at his faculty page (Asbury Theological Seminary)—and, of course, you can order a copy of his book through my page at Bookshop (or, really, anywhere books are sold.) A special thank you to Rachel at Paraclete Press for making it happen.