No Wrong Way to Pray
Thoughts from a Professional Pray-er
"Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God.” – Augustine
Despite what you might have heard in Sunday school class when you were young, there is no right or wrong way to pray. Prayer is simply the act of paying attention to the Divine. Some might follow a written, prescribed prayer while others might toss up a word in their minds here and there. Others “pray with their feet,” as in making sure their actions are bringing about the hoped for outcome.
Christians are instructed to “pray without ceasing” which some might interpret as having a strict devotional routine. I like to think of it as an invitation to see how prayer might show up in all aspects of our days and lives.
Sometimes my own prayers have been emails I wrote to Jesus (my Lenten practice one year), other times it is me raging at God by yelling in the car. Sometimes it is singing or chanting, other times it is reflective noticing. Prayer does not always involve words. It is often silent. It can even be walking in the woods, listening to music, crying in the shower or hugging a loved one. What turns these ordinary acts into sacred ones is the intention we bring to it and how they help us to converse with God.
Spiritual writer Anne Lamott emphasizes that prayer does not need to be wordy or elegant. She writes in her book Help Thanks Wow: The Three Essential Prayers,
“My three prayers are variations on Help, Thanks, Wow. That's all I'll ever need, besides the silence, the pain, and the pause sufficient for me to stop, close my eyes, and turn inward.”
If you’re struggling with how to pray, you might consider Lamott’s guidance as a rubric.
Sometimes we over-focus on the intercessory aspect of prayer. Our prayers are listing off what we want to happen. It is tempting to see God as a cosmic Santa Claus - if we give God a list of everything that should be going right in our lives, then God should intervene to change our circumstances. My beliefs around this have changed dramatically over the years as I have sat with thousands of people who have not gotten what they prayed for (usually for their loved ones to overcome illness). I now view the point of prayer as giving voice to our inmost desires, not so we can change God’s mind to act, but so the act of prayer can change us.
C.S. Lewis’ thoughts on this mirror my own,
"I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I'm helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn't change God. It changes me.”
It is a weird thing to pray for a living. Many people assume that’s all hospital chaplains do - going around saying prayers for patients. But in fact, I only offer to say a prayer aloud for a patient/family probably about 50% of the time, maybe less. It is something I approach delicately and with discretion. Knowing the variety of people’s spiritual experiences, I rely on a developed sense of intuition as to whether prayer might be welcome. I do not want anyone to feel pressured into receiving a prayer, so I only ask if I sense it would be a welcomed intervention.
Here is a time when my initial prayer assessment was a little off. At first.
“Our Father”
I met Barry’s family in the ICU waiting room. They were getting ready to say their final goodbyes to him after the ventilator was removed. When I meet families in this situation I offer a few suggestions for this window of time.
I tell people that there is no right or wrong way to enter into this space and invite them to follow whatever their hearts are leading them to say or do.
I reassure them that if they find they can’t stay in the room, leaving is ok.
I explain what my role is, namely, to offer support and help guide them through the process.
If I sense it would be welcome, I’ll offer to pray.
When I had this conversation with Barry’s family, they were adamant that there would be no praying– not in the waiting room, not in Barry’s room – they were not interested! Slightly humbled, I silently vowed to re-examine my intuition that I thought had served me well. When I got a nod from the nurse, I walked Barry’s brother, sister and brother-in-law back into his room, after his breathing tube had been removed.
His brother sat at his right hand and his sister and her husband at his left and I stood at the foot of his bed. Barry’s sister thanked him for looking out for her when she was younger and apologized for not being around more often in the last few years. Barry’s brother told him that they would miss him, but it was his time and he should head toward the light.
And then everyone was quiet.
After a few minutes his sister suddenly broke the silence saying “Our Father, who art in Heaven..” and the others quickly joined in. They repeated that prayer over and over again.
There was a brief pause during which the brother repeated a prayer mantra of his own. “We love you Barry” he declared in varying speeds and tones.
The “Hail Mary” was then said as well as the “Gloria Patri.” I was asked to say an extemporaneous prayer, an offer which I of course obliged, and attempted to hide my confusion. A few more moments of silence passed before they started the Lord’s Prayer again, during which Barry drew his final breath.
As I escorted Barry’s family to the elevators, my curiosity got the better of me and I asked his sister, “What led you to start praying in the room?”
She told me they had initially resisted my offer of prayer because they were more spiritual than religious. But as she was sitting there in the room, she remembered when she and Barry heard of their mother’s death and the first thing Barry did was say the “Our Father.”
She said, “I thought that’s what Barry might want, and then after the first time we said it, I realized it’s what I needed.”
"The quiet repetition of a single word can help us to descend with the mind into the heart." - Henri Nouwen
One prayer practice that I learned in my Spiritual Direction training that I find transformative is Centering Prayer. The practice involves saying a word or short phrase over and over again. In their own way, without realizing, Barry’s family was engaging in a kind of Centering Prayer. This simple act can ground us in the moment and helps us connect to the presence of the Divine within.
In her book, Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening, Cynthia Bourgeault describes this prayer thusly,
“It’s very, very simple. You sit, either in a chair or on a prayer stool or mat, and allow your heart to open toward that invisible but always present Origin of all that exists.”
I’m not sure why this type of prayer has not caught on more in Christian circles. It seems like the closest thing Christians have to meditation. I didn’t learn about it until after I went to seminary, and had been an ordained minister for over a decade. To borrow a phrase from the kids and influencers – it feels like we are “gate-keeping” this meaningful, contemplative practice. I’ve outlined it below for you to try on and see if it works for you.
Centering Prayer
A simple meditation practice focusing on a sacred word to connect with the Divine more deeply
Choose a sacred word
Pick a simple word, either a desire of your heart (ie. love, grace, peace), or a name of God (Healer, Creator, Yahweh) or whatever word feels right to you.
Find a quiet spot, set a timer & get comfortable
Many do 20 minutes, but I recommend starting with 5 or 10 (you can always increase later)
Getting comfortable might mean seated, feet on the floor - but I think you can always lay down too. Close your eyes or soften your gaze.
Be still
In the time that follows, try to become quiet and let your thoughts go. Each time a thought enters, it is an opportunity to return to God. Simply say your word internally to connect you to God. Don’t worry if your mind wanders, just notice it and then return to God again.
When the timer goes off, take some deep breaths and pause for a moment before opening your eyes, reflecting on what the time was like. Some people also like to journal about what came up for them during centering prayer time.
Thank you, Christine. Centering Prayer has been a regular practice for me since I learned it via Thomas Keating videos at my church in 2006-2007. It has affected me profoundly in many ways, especially (sometimes) being able to hold things in a nondualistic way and seeing more with eyes of love. My practice has deepened over the years with reading and studying with the Center for Action and Comtemplation, Richard Rohr, James Finley, Cynthia Bourgeault, Dr. Barbara Holmes, Brian McLaren, and many others.
This is such an excellent post, Christine. Maybe it's just the circles I'm in, but I have tried to introduce the practice of centering prayer to various groups. Interestingly, all of the groups, regardless of age, ethnicity, or any other socioeconomic flavor difference that may be found, all suffered from the same malady which you speak of; just the practice of sitting quiet, one word or thought, was nearly impossible for even a short time. All of the participants reported the almost impossible task of quieting the inner voice or having trouble focusing or returning to the holding word. I'm a big fan of Thomas Keating and Cynthia Bourgeault so it is a very cherished practice for me. A side effect of living in a privileged society--we have too much to occupy our minds, constantly, at our fingertips. Contemplation is a discipline, truly.