Reflections for 3/9/10

"Many of us think prayer is meditating on good, holy churchy thoughts, or preparing sermons, all up in the head. Why don't we, as sons and daughters, talk directly to our Father as if we know and believe he's there? To talk to God takes a childlike attitude. If we need always to be in control, we can't talk like a child to our mother." (R. Rohr "Radical Grace" p.122)

As I meditated on what prayer is for me, I begin with the reality that prayer begins for me in the context of the Book of Common Prayer, I am an Episcopalian/Anglican after all. I don't see the Prayer Book as a crutch but more as the foundation and the launching point. When I can't self start, it gives me the framework to begin. Sometimes I stay in that framework, but often it will nudge me into a more free flowing conversation with God.

I don't spend a lot of time in my "head." A good chunk of what I pray, what I write, and what I preach is more "gut" than "head."

Fr. Rohr's question about why we don't talk directly to God is a good one. I suppose it begins with a need to really trust that he is there. That can be hard when we don't get audible answers. It would be like having a parent not respond immediately when a child says "Mom!" or "Dad!" Of course most childlike conversations revolve around the question why? Or asking for permission, or asking for something? And like most children we don't really like being told no. This may be another reason that we don't talk to God like that, we're afraid that the answer may be no, so why bother asking.

Yet as adults we may still want to talk to God, not with childlike questions, but more in the mirroring of the parent/child relationship. I'm still the son, I'm not the adult friend. How I talk to my parents may have matured, or at least I hope it has. The trust in their love for me is the motivation for the conversation.

And that is why I still talk with God. There are still why questions for me? There still our needs that I have, there is still permission that I seek. Again I don't get an audible answer usually, but I have found that things become clearer about what is truly important to me, what I really need to do, and to come to some level of peace with the why question, because of that belief that God is there.

Blessings,
Ed