Shalom........... A thought #Prayerrope In recent time we saw a - TopicsExpress

Shalom........... A thought #Prayerrope In recent time we saw a amazing knowledge sharing about Prayer ropes in Indian Orthodox Church. Just little concerned that in future it will turn out to be like Catholic rosary, i mean now rosary is used like a fashion statement. Orthodox Prayer ropes like Orthodox Iconography are not just mere arts, they are termed as SACRED ARTS. There is a purpose behind every steps we follow while doing sacred arts. As Revelation reveals Christ as ALPHA and OMEGA(First and the Last) similarly Sacred arts are made revealing the extent of Christs presence in every single step. In Prayer ropes, the person who makes it, is liable to keep the sacredness of every single steps he follows while making it. Its a genuine, graceful ,Sacred art. In our Indian Orthodox Church, this initiative was brought by MGOCSM Orthodox prayer rope team. I havent seen anyone else doing it the way they did. I was more inspired by the objective of this initiative, which is purely for a good cause. They spread the message, people learned it, they conducted seminars specially for this and whatever they received is not for their personal gain rather went for charity and to buy more material to continue this knowledge sharing. Here is what one of the team member said, Our objective is to spread this knowledge not earn any profit, what is suitable for us we take, rest is for charity The Orthodox prayer rope team is bounded with this objective. No one from this Prayer rope team ever commercialized this initiative. Making Prayer rope as a business only for our personal gain is not worth unless you are not sharing it. I do agree that ,the prayer rope is traditionally made from black color. Preferably from wool because the place from where it was originated wools was easily available. And we must always try to make it natural as much as possible. Now prayer ropes can be found in many colors today. Like in Iconography, if we are using different colors, then we must give meaning to those colors. Like black was used by monks because its is also the color of mourning, to remind us of Christ’s words, “blessed are they who mourn, for they will be consoled” (Matt 5:4). Black is traditional because its meaningful, without this meaning even black color is worthless. I dont see any fault, in the color unless its reflecting a meaning. Like green symbolizes Holy Spirit; Red n Blue symbolizes God the Son; White Symbolizes Resurrection; Pink or Violet symbolizes royalty or God the father. I hope we will give meaning to this. I hope we all will use , learn and will continue to keep the sacredness of Prayer rope. Its not a criticism but just my thoughts. —