Prayer
is not technique
for
getting things, pious
exercise
to make God
happy.
Prayer
is not a ticket
to
heaven. It’s more
like
practicing heaven
now.
Prayer
is a way of seeing
that
takes away anxiety
for
figuring it all out
here.
Needing
to be right about
everything.
Here, now God
becomes more verb than
noun.
God--more process than conclusion,
more
experience than dogma,
more
intimacy than
idea.
Someone
is dancing with you,
and
you are not afraid
of
getting it
wrong.
*This poem is a very close paraphrase, almost a quote of the following Richard Rohr passage from The Naked Now: Learning to see as the mystics see.
In
prayer, we merely keep returning the divine gaze and we become its reflection,
almost in spite of ourselves (2 Corinthians 3:18). The word “prayer” has often been
trivialized by making it into a way of getting what we want. But I use “prayer”
as the umbrella word for any interior journeys or practices that allow you to
experience faith, hope, and love within yourself. It is not a technique
for getting things, a pious exercise that somehow makes God happy, or a
requirement for entry into heaven. It is much more like practicing heaven now.
Such
prayer, such seeing, takes away your anxiety for figuring it all out fully for
yourself, or needing to be right about your formulations. At this point, God
becomes more a verb than a noun, more a process than a conclusion, more an
experience than a dogma, more a personal relationship than an idea. There is
Someone dancing with you, and you are not afraid of making mistakes.
