Ronald Rolheiser and FALSE FEELINGS IN PRAYER

 

(friary chapel)

 

FALSE FEELINGS IN PRAYER

 

Prayer, as one of its oldest definitions puts it, is "lifting mind and heart to God."   That sounds simple, but it is hard to do.  Why?

 

Because we have the wrong notion of what that means.   We unconsciously nurse the idea that we can pray only when we are not distracted, not angry, not emotionally or sexually preoccupied.   We think God is like a parent who wants to see us only on our best behavior.  So we go into God's presence only when we have nothing to hide, are joy-filled, and feel we can give proper attention to God in a reverent and loving way.   Because we don't understand what prayer is,  we treat God as an authority figure or a visiting dignitary -- as someone to whom we don't tell the real truth.   We don't tell God what is really going on in our lives.  We tell God what we think God wants to hear.

 

Because of this, we find it difficult to pray with any regularity.  What happens is we go to pray, privately or in church, feeling tired, preoccupied, perhaps even angry at someone.   We bracket what we are actually feeling and instead try to crank up praise, reverence, and gratitude to God.   Of course, it doesn't work!   Our hearts and heads (because they are preoccupied with our real issues) grow distracted.   We get the sense that what we are doing -- trying to pray -- is not something we can do right now and we leave it for some other time.

 

But the problem is not that our prayer is unreal or that the moment isn't right.   The problem is that we are trying to lift to God thoughts and feelings that are not our own.   If we take seriously that prayer is  "lifting mind and heart to God,"  then every feeling and every thought we have is a valid and apt entry into prayer, no matter how irreverent, unholy, selfish, sexual, or angry that thought or feeling might seem. 

 

Simply put, if you go to pray and you are feeling angry,  pray anger;  if  you are sexually preoccupied,  pray that preoccupation;  if you are feeling murderous,  pray murder;  and if you are feeling full of fervor and want to praise and thank God,  pray fervor.   Every thought or feeling is a valid entry into prayer.   What's important is that we pray what's inside of us and not what we think God would like to see inside of us.

 

What's so unfortunate is that,  most often, because we misunderstand prayer, we stay away from it just when we most need it.   We try to pray only when we feel good, centered, reverent, and worthy of praying.   But we don't try to pray precisely when we most need it;  that is, when we are feeling bad, irreverent, sinful, emotionally and sexually preoccupied, and unworthy of praying.

 

But all of these feelings can be our entry into prayer.  No matter the headache or the heartache,  we need only to lift it up to God.

 

(Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI,  has written a new book, PRAYER:  OUR DEEPEST LONGING, published by Franciscan Media in 2013.  More about this book is available at www.FranciscanMedia.org.)