My dog and prayer

I was reflecting recently on my 102 year old mother’s move to an assisted living facility. Until a short stay in hospital for a couple of months recently, she lived independently, though relying heavily on my sister, who lives nearby, for the last year or so. I was wondering what those now charged with her care might know of her earlier life. One of the things which popped into my mind was how, almost as early as I can remember, she taught me to pray.

That was prayer for a child, but it began a journey for me. I have tried a large number of different ways to pray, often called techniques. At different times, different ways were more or less satisfying - mostly less.

If you are content with how you pray and live within the paradigm of a God to whom you address yourself in thanksgiving or intercession, you probably shouldn’t read any further. I have no wish to turn anyone from what ‘works’ for them. . I do want to suggest that there are other ways to address the process we call prayer. A significant number of people have shared with me their discomfort with what they perceive is required of them in prayer.

The search for meaning, for a way to make sense of our lives, for a way to find a context in which, who we think, or feel, ourselves to be seems to be a universal search. Atheists and non-believers, if I read their writings aright, have a need for context too. I find it hard to imagine that anyone, other than those with significant psychological disturbance, can live without context and a belief system. We believe certain things about ourselves and our world and our relationship to that world, whether we set that in a religious context, or not.

I find myself no longer living with a paradigm of a God, distinct from the world, but who either chooses, or who can be persuaded by me, to take an active role in fulfilling my wants and needs. I don’t have a sense that that God might, if only I pray hard enough and long enough and with greater refining of my need, intervene on my behalf in some way. Nor can I pray to that God to alleviate hunger in the world, as if he were a heavenly farmer, or bring peace to the world, as if he were a super-negotiator, or cure my dog of his diabetes however much I might want that.

In fact my dog provides me with a good example of what I mean. Our West Highland White terrier is now 14 years old. He has been a wonderful dog and we have vested in him a great deal of affection. He is now diabetic, blind and hard of hearing. We dread the day when either he dies naturally, or we make the decision that, because he is in unnecessary and uncontrollable pain or distress, we should bring his life to a close. I cannot and would not pray for his recovery, no matter how painful his loss will be to us. I would like to think that there is a miracle out there, but I do not live as if there was.

I do pray about him and here is how it goes. In my times set aside for this activity, which could be called prayer, or reflection, or meditation, he will come to my mind. I will reflect on who he is and his present condition, the treatment we give to, or withhold from him. I will think about my wants for him and how they might intersect with his needs. I will recognize the responsibility we have undertaken for him. I will try to assess how my wants and his needs can be balanced – and I will remember that he is part of that holy thing we call creation. It is holy, because it is unique to us. He is holy because he is unique to us and a gift which we have received from that creation. From within this time of ‘prayer,’ I find myself renewed in my sense of responsibility for him and actively to give him the best care I can.

I apply that to ‘prayer’ for peace in our world. I do not expect what we call God to resolve that issue for me. Conflict comes from within me. I believe that there is evil, but I do not believe that it has existence outside sentient beings. Evil things happen and they have a human cause. (Consequent on this I do not believe in ‘the devil’ as an entity outside humanity. It is a metaphor for that evil within us which we really can’t, or won’t, own). So if I pray for peace, I know that it can only be achieved by my actions and those of others. If I want peace in the world I have to actively work for it in me, the communities to which I belong and the world of which I am a part. For me, that means working for that which precedes peace, justice. I do not believe that we can ever find peace until we have first created just dealing one with another.

The same would apply to other issues like hunger and sickness. If I am to ‘pray’ for those who are hungry, I must be active on their behalf, not just providing food, but working to end those practices, like unfair trading, which create the problem to begin with. I cannot pray for a God to feed them. These are issues of justice. For the sick, I may hold them in my heart and then visit with them, or provide support for them and those who take the responsibility for their care. I cannot pray for some miraculous cure, even though I may wish it.

I don’t know where I first heard or read a saying which goes something like, ‘Prayer changes me, not the things for which I pray.’