Magazine letter September 2024
A Nebraska banker whose bank went into failure during the depression came home and told his wife that they were going to lose everything. She said, “what shall we do?” He replied, “maybe we should pray.” She said, “Has it come to that?”
My first prayers were said asking for something, “God bless Mummy, God bless Daddy…” and without doubt my last prayers will be said asking for something, “Lord have mercy. . .” But then that is in the nature of things, our first words to our parents are inevitably demands. We live in relationship to people because of our need, needs that can only be satisfied by other people. As we grow what we need becomes more subtle and complicated, and our relationships develop and extend and become more subtle and complicated. It is how we are, how we have evolved to be.
When Jesus taught his disciples to pray he began with two simple words – “Our Father…”. Words of relationship, because beyond any other reason to pray there must be a desire to relate, to connect with God. Saying “our Father” reminds us that that is the position in which we stand, not as strangers seeking the unknown, not as the insignificant at the throne of the all powerful, but as people in relationship with their God. The analogy of a father and child can be difficult for some, not all fathers are good fathers. But given that any analogy is inadequate, the connection between a parent and a child does at least give us a place to start from, a place of relationship not based on sentimentality, or romantic emotion, or even transitory notions of friendship, a relationship where, at its best, love is without condition, challenging at times but always accepting, always forgiving, always welcoming.
At the heart of meaningful prayer will surely be a willingness to communicate, to deepen our connection with God. What we pray for might be because we want more than we know how to achieve on our own, ends that we have no means to obtain, needs that we cannot satisfy alone – but what we pray for doesn’t matter, it’s the connection, the communication, that counts. Think about a time when someone you loved was away from home and you waited for a phone call. Did you really care what they said so much as hearing their voice? God waits for us to communicate, to pray, to tell him about the kind of day we had, problems we face, the good things we experienced. What matters to us matters to him – from the trivial to the desperate.
Whether things happen differently because we pray, and our prayers are answered, or whether God just does not work in that way, is irrelevant – it’s the fact that we have directed ourselves toward him that counts: and the more open and sincere we are the deeper, the truer we are, the more fruitful that prayer will be, because we will be drawn further into the mind and heart of God, and the more fit we will be to face life and its challenges.
William