Do You Pray?



Angels of God,

Our guardians dear

Through whom God's Love

Commits thee here.

Ever this night

be at my side

to light

to guard

to rule

and guide.

 

A Prayer from My Childhood

 

Prayer

 

I have not done the traditional praying I was taught to do as a Catholic for a long, long  time.  I have not knelt with rosary in hand and fingered my way through the mysteries since my father's passing and then I did it for him.  I haven't really even said a Hail Mary or an Our Father, other than that.  I have not recited words that are so ingrained in me they come out between my whispering lips automatically when I begin to recite them. I have not prayed traditionally and committedly  in a long, long time.

I have, I guess, prayed in other ways.  I write two devotionals...in one I begin each entry with  "Dear Lord" and the other I begin with "Dear Angels"...The latter is directed mostly to the  guardian angels that I was taught to address as a child.  Does anyone else remember the prayer above?

 

Prayer and Meditation

 

I find such comfort writing to the angels.  It is not really a prayer but a conversation. I tend to focus more on this lately  than the other. Of course my daily writing in this  waxes and wanes too. 

I meditate daily and wonder...what is the difference between meditation and prayer?  Prayer is a form of meditation isn't it? 

 

I think  prayer is more of a plea, an expression of reverence and gratitude  for something "out there" as we maneuver our way around this physical world and mediation is more of a going inward away from the physical world where the answers lie. 

 

Prayer takes us from the "human" parts of us to the "spiritual" , and meditation brings  the "spiritual" parts of us to the human.

 

We seek God outside ourselves when we pray and we seek God inside us when we meditate.

In prayer we do the speaking in hope that Someone will listen.  In meditation we do the listening in hope that Someone will do the speaking.  ( Not necessarily literally...that would probably get us jumping  from the cushion to the ceiling  in record breaking speed.)

 

Does that make sense?  They can compliment each other can't they?

 

 

What We Pray To

 

Of Course God is a term I use and it has great meaning for me.  Someone else may use another word, have another "image" that they hold in mind when they pray or meditate.  I honestly believe, however,  we are all praying to the  Same Thing/No-Thing...to that Higher Power, that invisible Creative Force, that Love.

 

When I pray now I speak from my heart to that Something I call God.  Sometimes I speak directly and sometimes I go through the angels but I am fully aware as I pray and meditate that there is something Greater than me and all I perceive with my senses out there and in me.

 

Praying Again

 

Anyway, I bring that up because I have recently found myself praying again...maybe not in the traditional way of using memorized words and rosary beads on bent knees...but by speaking consciously  from my heart to that Something I call God either directly or through the angels. I began a committed practice last Thursday after an "innocent" phone call that seemed to leave me torn between fighting against what is and surrendering.  I subsequently chose surrendering.  

 

I am asking for the ability, in my prayers,  to surrender and accept this "not knowing" that is going on with my body and to be able to let it go, to surrender to the set of circumstances that will add another six months to my waiting. I want to use this set of circumstances as a leap into Faith.  Instead of fighting, demanding more, resisting this what is going down or not going down...I want to fall into faith, saying "It is okay.  It is as it is.  If I need to make changes in it, I will be shown when and how...for now...just accept and let it go!" To get the help to do that I pray. It is comforting. To remind myself that I am not these circumstances or this body even...I continue to meditate. 

 

Anyway, that is where I am at....and I am wondering if any of you pray too, why you pray and how you pray?  I am wondering what you get from prayer?

 

There have been so many studies done on the power of prayer I can't begin to cite them here.  I would, however, like to look more into this.  It is interesting, don't you think?

 

All is well.