Exploratory Thoughts on Prayer (III)

 

Why pray?  For contact with reality.  As the divine is a partner in the whole, so one who wishes to be attuned to all of reality, and especially to its ground and source, needs to be open to divine presence. Prayer is the openness of heart and mind to the living God. 

Prayer may take the form of praising God or asking for blessings, but the essential motive, I believe, is to move from a more self-enclosed world into the abyss of divine freedom. The divine is unbounded, unlimited, using a symbol employed by various ancient thinkers from Greece through India to China. Contact with the Unlimited may be disturbing, even frightening, but it is also liberating, moving one beyond one’s limits, especially from the confines of the self-contained world.

In this basic conception of prayer, one would probably not ask, “What should I pray for?,” or “To whom am I praying?” One is simply opening up to reality in its creative, life-engendering source. A word or name may be useful to focus attention or to remind myself of ultimate goodness, but a name or word may not be necessary. What matters is a strong, conscious, and deliberate desire to be awake, to tune in.

Although one can pray anywhere, at any time, a set time of quiet and alertness is highly recommended. Posture: sitting relaxed but alert, with head up, feet resting on the floor (or with legs up if necessary for circulation). Seeing: eyes preferably closed, mind not looking at any thing, real or imagined. Listening: not attending to sounds heard through the ears, nor to one’s thoughts, but to silence. Breathing: calm and steady, perhaps mindful of air passing through nostrils for a minute or so for calming.  Awake, not drowsy.  As for length of time, I recommend beginning with 15 minute sessions or so, and gradually increasing the time to about half an hour daily.

Given our Catholic roots, a certain kind of brief preparation for quiet sitting in prayer may be prudent. After making the sign of the cross, I think that reciting the Our Father or another favorite prayer, and perhaps reading some Scripture for 5 minutes or so, may serve to remind one of the goodness of the God to whom we turn in quiet prayer. But this preparation should be very brief, and not become an excuse to avoid sitting quietly in God’s presence.

Exploratory Thoughts on Prayer: Part II

 

A.  “Is special grace needed?”

 The following responds to several questions from a young man, a former student of mine, who read my brief “Exploratory thoughts on prayer.”  His questions are very good, and it should be worthwhile for us to consider the questions and my answers, as both may throw some light on the activity of prayer.  I indent his material below

You mentioned in your recent blog that prayer could be the response of man to the presence of the Divine and that in prayer, one listens as the Divine speaks. Does this imply that one needs a special grace in order to pray? And that God could choose to give that grace or abstain from giving that grace to a specific person? If a man struggles to pray, does he not have this grace or is he just lazy? What is the human element of prayer and what is the Divine?

First, dear friend, I would say that genuine prayer is always a response to divine prompting, and is in reality a work both of the human being and of the divine partner. If one thinks that he is praying on his own, then I would say that either he lacks living faith, or is oddly blind to the presence of God at work in him. By living faith I mean what St. Thomas Aquinas calls the fides caritate formata, faith formed [or enlivened] by charity. This conception apparently draws from the Apostle Paul’s words to the churches of Galatia, in which he insists that what matters is simply “faith working through love.”  Love is always a form of union of lover and beloved. If one trusts that God loves him, and loves in return, then there is indeed a real union, a kind of “circle of love.” On the other hand, if one prayed as if to a “God out there,” to “God in heaven,” without understanding that heaven is the presence of God, then the problem is not only a misunderstanding of prayer, but an imaginative divorcing of God from one’s consciousness or soul. And this imaginative alienation from God is highly common in our society, among “believers” and “agnostics” alike. This act of imagination in effect treats God not as a partner in reality, but as a kind of being separated from consciousness and from reality as we know it. Indeed, a primary problem in the history of Christianity at least since about the 16th century or so is this splitting of the divine from living presence in reality. In other words, modern Christianity has often presented God as a separate being, without communicating to the faithful the reality of the divine that encompasses each and all.  In short, in discussing prayer and problems of prayer, we must also make sure to avoid misunderstandings about who or what God is. Prayer ought to be a response to the living God, not a self-willed exercise towards an imagined “God,” perhaps constructed in imagination during childhood. On the other hand, religious beliefs may well serve as something like training wheels to move one gradually into more genuine prayer.

Next, you ask about needing a special grace to pray, and you draw out the logic of your question:  “Does this imply that God could choose to give that grace or abstain from giving that grace to a specific person?” My first response is caution, because I feel that we could be drawn into the kind of speculating on what happens “inside God” in a way that may be “theological,” but is beyond the realm of reason, of philosophy. For my part, I find speculation on “God’s election” and choosing some and not others to be disturbing and moving in the wrong direction. Let me begin from our side of the divine-human partnership, from concrete experience: the divine is available to each and to all, or we would not be human beings. It is the presence of God in the divine-human soul (psyche) that makes us what and who we are. God is present to us by who God is, and we can access the divine presence by who we are. Using Christian language, all of humankind makes up “the body of Christ,” really or potentially, as St. Thomas explained. It is “our nature” to be in God--or, if one prefers, to be in tension towards God. Surely some choose to neglect divine presence, blinding their own intellects to what is present, as St. Bonaventure described it, but I will surely not attribute such blindness to a fault in God. To claim that God graces some and not others, in my opinion, not only falsely speculates on God, but attributes extraordinary injustice to the Almighty. The question you raise almost sounds as though it comes from the Calvinist tradition, but apparently it is found among Catholics, too: that some may not be able to pray because they “lack the grace.” Whether those who neglect God are lazy or not (the sin of acedia, of spiritual laziness), one detects in their refusal to respond to the divine presence in them a willful act of resistance. Cicero called it “a rejection of reason,” using “reason” (ratio) in the sense discovered by the Greek philosophers as divine-human mutual participation. 

Now, your questions can also be taken to point in a different direction, and we shall explore it briefly. God breaks into some souls in extraordinary ways, as we see in Moses, the Hebrew prophets, Jesus, the Apostle Paul; and in Greeks known for their response to God, such as Hesiod, Parmenides, Heracleitos, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus. The truly great spiritualists of history, be they prophets, saints, philosophers, or sages, as far as we know from their writings, had unique experiences of divine presence in them. Paul’s vision of the resurrected Christ, for example in unlike anything found in the Hebrew prophets or in the Greek philosophers.  Now, the prayer-response of Socrates would be different from that of the Apostle Paul, as each man had different experiences of God. But both men responded to the presence--the “grace”--received. When the divine breaks into consciousness in an extraordinary way, then one would expect that person to respond differently. I interpret Plato’s dialogues as a response to his experience in the divine breaking into his soul, with his use of intellect to explore the experiences; and I interpret the letters of Paul as grounded in his experiences of the Resurrected Christ, and his intense awareness of Christ / the Spirit of Christ at work in his consciousness (soul). 

So in this sense, divine grace varies. But to maintain that some souls are outside of God, and receive no divine impulses, conveys, I believe, a bizarre conception of God as willful, capricious, even demonic if God causes human beings to be ungraced, beyond the pale of his ordering presence. Furthermore, we are not isolated beings. What God did for Moses, God did for all who will respond to that divine action. Moses and the other outstanding spiritualists are representative of humankind. (Note: I often quote Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s famous question in Emile, “Did God speak to Moses to speak to Jean-Jacques?”  And I say:  “You bet he did, and you ought to pay heed, and quit playing your introspective game of self-salvation.”)  What happened to the representative receivers of these great “revelations” happened in them and through them for all who respond with loving trust (faith).  You and I may respond as Moses did: humbly obey the leading of God in ways we never expected; and keep wondering, “Who are you, LORD?”  To claim that our faith is “apostolic” means that we receive gratefully, and meditate on, divine revelations to the apostles, such as Peter and Paul; through accepting what God did in them, we are partakers of the same “grace.”  Who is excluded? Only those who refuse to “open up” to the presence of God, or what in Christian tradition has often been called “the Holy Spirit.” If one is in the dark, one can wait in faith. Rebellion and the “will to power”- the way of our friend Nietzsche--is not forced on one's consciousness. One may stop playing games, stop “putting on masks,” and recognize and respond to the truth of reality as it presents itself. Reality--including the divine partner--is the measure, the standard, not one's own ego, imagination, beliefs, or wishes. What matters is the truth of reality.

     B. On distractions in prayer

My friend also asked about the problem of “distractions” in prayer.  His main points: 

To respond to your question regarding types of distractions I encounter during prayer, the list !is manifold. There are the minor distractions of a neglected duty, a physical discomfort, a memory of a recent conversation or event that I partook in.  And there is the major distraction of a noisy mind.

“Distractions” are to prayer as various personal challenges or emotional problems are to friendship or marriage. The divine attracts us to himself.  We are drawn, moved. Various forces attract us in other directions, or “distract” us from God. In overcoming distracting pulls away from God, we do indeed grow in genuine self-giving love for God, or in other words, become more like God, and surely develop firmer, more noble character.  For example: A young man, working in his father’s shop, encounters a pretty young girl one day, who evidently likes him, and is even a little flirtatious. Although friendly to her, this prudent young man knows the proper boundaries, and by resisting an inward pull to get close to her, in any excessive way, he grows in his faithful love to his beloved wife. That is how it is with distractions: Love grows stronger and more true by being tested. Perhaps we all encounter various distractions while in public prayer, as in liturgy. If the distractions are visual, one may advert or even close one’s eyes.  If they are auditory--such as crying children--one can accept them for what they are, not become judgmental or angry, and try to keep one’s conscious attention on the public prayer or preached word.  Distractions are much more distracting when we actively engage them, get angry, or think about them. In struggling against such distractions we gain inner peace. In personal prayer or meditation of any kind, of course distractions will arise, because our consciousness is not simple, but subject to various pulls. If you are seeking God, then seek God, regardless of other thoughts or feelings that should arise--even obsessive thoughts, such as a repeatedly heard tune or phrase, or memories of that pretty young lady. Let them be, or, if you prefer, place them “under the cloud of forgetfulness,” as the author of The Cloud of Unknowing instructs his readers.  

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Now I will get more specific and concrete based on my experiences in prayer.  I thrive with several kinds of prayer: The first kind of prayer is by closely studying a text that draws my attention towards God (such as reading a Gospel, a letter by the Apostle, or a Platonic dialogue). A second way is by meditating or thinking about God or the divine-human relationship. A third way is by writing down my thoughts and exploring them as I seek to be conscious of God. A fourth and I think most complete and truly satisfying way is not to entertain any particular thoughts about God, but by seeking God as God is, or simply “letting God be God,” the method carefully explained in the Cloud.

The kind of distractions one experiences, and how to handle them, vary with the kind of prayer. When studying a text, I simply attempt to keep my attention on the words, and to think about their meaning with as much clarity and understanding as I can muster. In this form of prayer, one may indeed entertain thoughts, as long as they are related to what one is studying. 

Second, when thinking about God in meditation, one must be attentive and sift and weigh each thought for its truth, in light of truth already understood. One seeks to expand the range of one’s divine awareness, and to deepen the sense of union. Whatever aids in this goal is good. When one attempts to sit still and alone in God’s presence, without any thought, but simply stretching out the soul into the divine presence, then any particular sensation, feeling, or thought is a distraction. What one does is not to engage the distraction, not to think about it, or dwell on it, but let it as it were drift on downstream, as the mind keeps watchfully alert towards the One present. This technique is only learned by practice: sit still and be alert to God’s presence. In the kind of prayer that employs concentrated writing can serve as a remarkable check on distractions. In other words, I recommend that on occasion one sit quietly and write out one’s praying-activity, because the concentration needed to write focuses the mind, and keeps diverting one away from distractions. Consciousness can fragment in various directions within a few moments of time, but thoughtful writing (as distinct from mere daydreaming on paper) forces consciousness to focus.  If distractions happen to arise (such as hearing a disturbing noise in the street), one does not dwell on that sound, but thinks about forming and writing thoughts on the page. Indeed, I highly recommend the exercise of writing prayer, with one special caveat: Beware of excessive introspection in any way. Generally, introspection has replaced meditation in our culture. We dwell on ourselves. Think about and towards God, and keep your attention God-ward. Keep self-referential thoughts in check.

More to follow.

A Few Exploratory Thoughts On Prayer

What is prayer?  St. Bonaventure’s brief summary articulates the common Christian understanding: “Prayer is the raising of the heart and mind to God.”  By “heart” he refers to our willing and desiring, including our emotions; by “mind” he means our reason, intellect, that with which we think and know. As he does not mention the body, we can usefully remember the words of the Apostle Paul: “Offer your bodies [yourselves] as a living sacrifice to God, holy and acceptable, which is your reasonable service [or, spiritual worship].  Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your minds / hearts” [Romans 12].

Bonaventure’s brief phrase raises some questions: Does one raise the heart and mind to God [ad deum], or into God, or perhaps both? Raising the heart and mind “into God” seems preferable, for it communicates the notion one is dealing with present reality, and not with a “thing” or “being” that is “out there” or “up there.”  Praying as an activity “to God” is more spatial, suggesting that God may be a “separate substance” or being-thing apart from what one experiences here. To move “into God” leaves open the possibility that what we call “God” and is already present to one’s consciousness [or soul], whether or not one chooses to remember and to attend.

To what human activities is prayer most akin?  It is a kind of communication, as are speaking and listening. But it is more of a communing with than a “talking to another,” I would suggest.  If this is true, than prayer is close to meditation or thinking about God, when one is aware that “God” is not apart or a being or a thing at all, but the divine Presence experienced in consciousness. In this sense, to pray is essentially to be aware of God’s presence, as suggested by the Psalmist: “Be still and know that I AM God.”  Stillness and awareness of divine presence, perhaps remembered as He Who Is, would seem to be the basic activity underlying various kinds of prayer. Without this simple remembering awareness of divine presence, one may be speaking towards God or a god, but perhaps not “praying” in its essential meaning.

In other words, are not some types of prayer more truly prayer? Is it possible that one thinks that he or she is “praying,” but is not? Is it possible that someone may actually be praying, although they are not aware of it as “prayer?” Could it fittingly be claimed that any form of activity in which one is truly mindful (attentive, aware) is prayer, at least implicit prayer?  Or does one need to invoke certain words, such as “God,” or “Lord,” in order for the activity to be prayer?
 
Example, or a brief remembrance: In 1992, while walking through the Imperial Gardens near the Emperor’s palace in Tokyo, I photographed, as has been my custom since childhood. With the ancient stone walls, the immaculately groomed plants, and the utter silence and lack of commotion in the gardens (no one running, no one speaking loudly [not even an American], no children crying], I was able to concentrate to a high degree on photographing.  The combination of the Zen-inspired beautiful order, the silence, and my loving concentration induced an intense state of awareness that I still recall twenty years later. Although I did not explicitly call on a deity or saint, I was intensely aware of reality--of It as a whole--as I was fully conscious in the moment. I felt intensely alive, present, joyful. To my way of thinking, this experience was truly “prayer” as union with that which is, not a mere uttering words towards God without recollection and concentration. Unfortunately, the photographs, which I knew at the time were among the best I have ever taken, were not properly developed. They recorded my focused state, or “Zen mind, open mind,” borrowing the phrase of a Zen master. The photographs have been lost, but recollection of the experience abides.
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We begin again, understanding that a meditative experience, or an experience of open consciousness, of quiet awareness, may not be what some of us would consider prayer. (Admittedly, I wonder, “Why not?” But I also assume that many have been taught that using words towards God is prayer, and I know that new paths need to be explored carefully and in a way that some, at least, may follow.)  So we employ some words in a prayer: You creatively form all things according to your wisdom. We humbly ask You to guide our hearts, LORD God, so that we truly love you, and guide our minds to wonder about you, and perhaps to know you as you let yourself be known. Bring each and all of us, every creature, into full communion with you, each according to its way of being. Make us awake and alive during our brief sojourn here. Amen. 

St. Thomas Aquinas wrote prayers and hymns, but I think that his great prayer was his scholarly work, for it is evident that his heart and mind were set on God first and foremost, and that he examined other beings (especially human being) in relation to God.  If one would not wish to call such philosophical theology “prayer,” then perhaps one could call it: mindfulness of the reality of God, and a concentrated act of response to the One seeking Thomas to love and to know Him.

What is mindfulness of the reality of God? Well, it surely is remembering what one ought to remember, and not forgetting: that the “I AM” who spoke to Moses out of the burning bush is also present to the consciousness of every human being.  That which we call “God” is the eternalizing or immortalizing presence experienced in consciousness.  And it is this divine “Creator” that forms and orders each being thing for what it is, as depicted in the opening chapter of Genesis in the great story of creation. To be mindful of this creative, formative presence is to be mindful of God.

Without mindfulness of God, without awareness of divine presence, what would prayer be?  “To say one’s prayers” could mean to one without this awareness of presence, “Talk to `the man up there.’”  Is that prayer, or it is more an act of unformed imagination?  I wonder if some persons never get past this form of praying as “saying your prayers.” Does it dawn on a person in this mode of existence that one does not form one’s words alone, but that Another, the divine, is present aiding the process, and moving one to pray as a means of realizing a truer union? What would prayer be, if it were the product of someone who thought that he or she was praying by one’s own strength and light, and not aware of the inner light and divine force moving in and through one? Would not offering prayers in the belief that oneself is doing it an example of the ancient heresy called Pelagianism?  If one can pray by himself or herself to God, could not one also save oneself, or perfect oneself? Is it possible that a person who prays without being aware that God is moving the prayer is actually immersed in an exercise of self, engaged in a self-centered activity? Could such a form of prayer be a kind of alienation from God, more than a union with the Spirit of the Creator? 

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Do you pray? If so, why? And who or what is causing you to pray?  Could it be that when you pray, it is the divine that is praying, and you are listening? Is it possible that the ultimate source and cause of all that exists draws human beings to be aware of the divine present and active here, now, everywhere? Is it possible that prayer is more a response to divine activity in us than something we generate on our own? If our prayer is not a response to God, to what is it a response? Could self-generated prayers be a response to fear--of being damned to hell, or of failing to be “a good boy or girl” if one does not pray in a “churchy” way? 

A possibility: Anything in one’s life that is a response to divine presence could be called “prayer,” for it is a means through which one is becoming one with the One. Praying in words is one way to respond. So is listening to God, or waiting in utter silence. So is what the Benedictine tradition called “divine reading” (lectio divina), in which one studies a sacred text with the desire to listen to God, and with firm trust that God is speaking to the reader in that very activity, in and through the words on the page. So here we see three ways to respond to God moving us to pray: speaking words to God; listening for the Lord in silence; studying a sacred text, mindful of God working through the words on the mind of the attentive reader.
 
And when Mother Theresa arose from the chapel where she had been meditating before the Blessed Sacrament, and walked into the streets of Calcutta to find and to tend to the sick and dying, was she not responding to God, and hence, still praying? Was not her service of love a heartfelt response to the living God, who loves all of its creatures? Deeds of charity, done by one longing for God’s companionship, are surely ways of responding to God, and hence I would say, within the range of what is called “prayer” in our Catholic tradition.

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Do you pray, and if so, what in particular makes you want to pray? Where do you go to pray? Do you have a favorite place, or time of day, when you deliberately turn your heart and mind to God? Or are you content to just utter a few words every so often, and chalk up your chatter to “prayer?”  Do you need to be in a church to pray? Can you pray in church at all, or is it too distracting for you there?  Do you struggle against distractions in order to concentrate on what you are doing, or do you just let the distractions rule you? Are these questions a form of distraction, or a form of prayer, or neither, or perhaps both?  How does one know when one is praying, and not just “going through the motions?” Are you going through the motions, “jumping through hoops” (so to speak) when you pray? Or are you truly making contact with God?  Is your prayer in God, or out of God?

Do you seek God? If so, how? If you do not seek God, why not?  Did not Jesus say, “Seek, and you will find?” He did not say, “Assume that you have already found God, just the way you are.” Nor did he say, “I got saved!”  What he did say was, “It is not those who cry, `Lord, Lord,’ who enter the Kingdom, but those who do the will of my heavenly Father.”  And what is God’s will for you? Do you ask the LORD to make it known, and do you faithfully follow His pulls in you?

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It is speaking to me this evening, and I am attending. It arrested my attention by its beauty in the setting sun. Then it caught my attention as I walked by the bedroom, with the stain glass art of the burning bush hanging in a window, illuminated by the light of the reddened sun. It made me stop what I was doing, be attentive, look closely, enjoy. I was surely drawn by beauty, which I understand to be the glory of God, the face of the hidden One. No words were spoken.  My prayer was my loving gaze at God’s beauty shining through, And yes, I am mindful of being experientially close to a famous passage in St. Augustine’s Confessions as I write these words.

Why not, when the same One is drawing everyone to itself, and many are moved to attend through the perception of beauty? “But that is not prayer,” someone may say, “because you are not talking to God.” No, the divine is speaking to me, and I am awed by its beauty.  Awed and humbled, to be in the presence of that which is overwhelmingly beautiful and good. 

Where have you gone, you who spoke to my heart through the setting sun? Why have I stopped seeing what you display? Perhaps because I am concentrating on writing, and not attending to your divine work all around me / within me. Have you guided this brief meditation in any way? If there is any truth or goodness here, it comes from you. But I sense that my thoughts have moved too quickly, my words sometimes flippantly, not giving you the quiet in which to work. God opens the soul into peace. But to experience God’s peace, one must cease being merely complacent. In the realm of prayer, this means, perhaps, letting go of old habits and attending to God afresh, and sometimes in ways not so often travelled. 

Stopping to write, I simply look up. I see so much beauty around me: the dogs lying on the bed, sleeping; the moody-dark, cloudy sky in the evening twilight, brooding mysteriously outside the windows; paintings and works of art all around where I am sitting, and looking back at me as I look at them; light gracing the hard wooden floor, revealing it as alive in some way; the stillness of the evening, when you and I have time together, apart from the clatter of the day. And a slowing down even of my breathing, as I move towards my resting place. I do not feel you, but I trust that you are here, in me and with me, even as I write. What energy would I have, if not for you? What sense of purpose, what desire to write something for these good parishioners who sacrifice time to attend faith class?  I am conscious of your loving, guiding presence, LORD, and this awareness is joyful, and quiet, and the best kind of prayer I know for me.  Indeed, I feel fleeting moments of a joy that borders on ecstasy when, mindful of you, I see with a loving and joyful freshness. With you and in you, all has meaning, and beauty, and finds its home.  Each thing lights up, radiant with your light, shining within and without. Apart from you, life is stale, dull, tedious, and unprofitable. “Lord, you are my light and my salvation.”  Being mindful of you, and grateful, is prayer, and what I desire to offer to you until I enter fully into your peace.  And then “all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”
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Remember: “Your life work is to have such experiences, and to seek to understand them.” “Do not forget the deeds of the LORD,” but remember.

--Wm. Paul McKane, OSB
13 June 2013