"The Mystery of Prayer"

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

The first real stumbling block, in my opinion, for this reflection book.

You know, I didn't really know just how hollow the "it's God's plan" argument can ring with an unanswered prayer until I heard it echoed by my 8th grade class.  It felt like a small piece of what atheists must feel -- the ones who turn in anger from the idea of a kind and loving God who would let the Holocaust happen.  I forget quite how it came up, and if anyone at my school is reading this: don't worry, I don't think I betrayed my feelings to the students.

But I just...it broke something in me to hear this young, for the most part wonderful young people of faith calling the Holocaust part of God's plan.  A few of them had odd little theories about, say, the Holocaust being a remembrance and warning that will keep us from doing this when we have more efficient methods of destruction at our disposal, which is interesting and inventive of them.

It's not the most personal this question has ever been.  That honor goes to my uncle, who after my father died expressed his bewilderment at God's plan.  "He was doing so much good.  I just don't understand how this could be God's plan."  My father was one of the most respected family law judges in Texas, if not the most respected.  On a daily basis, he did more good for more people than I have this entire year.  How could it be God's plan for such a man to die before his time?

I've invented little things -- perhaps some case was going to come up in a few months that would have forced him into a no win situation spiritually.  Maybe something terrible was coming down the turnpike.  Maybe maybe.  Nothing satisfactory.

But it was watching these young people who I am trying (largely against their will) to equip with tools to navigate the world around them (sometimes I just sit and think how innocent they are) spouting off these words that just felt so inadequate in the face of what we were talking about...

They don't hear it yet.  They don't hear how hollowly those words ring.  They don't hear how stupid they sound in your ears or feel on your tongue yet.  They don't...their world is simpler and ultimately fair -- you should see how they freak out if anything they think isn't "fair" and "right" happens.  Giving them half an hour over lunch of thinking even just the small world of my classroom would be unfair* unleashed a STORM.

* I explained the real lesson to them at the end of the day.

I don't have anything better to give them.  I tried to give them my tactic, but they weren't ready for the idea that prayer is for US not GOD.  That we go to church on Sunday for OURSELVES not because GOD needs it or we're doing it wrong.

It sounds self-centered if phrased the wrong way, and the book even calls it one of the pitfalls of prayer, but I believe that religion is not our gift to God but God's gift to us.  Another sign of how He loves us.  One of many ways He uses to be close to us.  To abide with us.  To comfort and exult and just be with us.  To share our lives.  Because He loves us that much.

Today has been an odd day, where I a lot is ringing hollow, but there are moments of grace everywhere.  Music lifting my spirits at last, reminders of God in this project.  A gentle redirect from above.

Prayer is one kind of grace -- a kind we can officially solicit and join.  That is the purpose of prayer.  That is the answer.