Rick Hamlin - Pray for Me: Finding Faith in a Crisis

Its not what you do, its what God does. Its not how hard you try, its how willing you are not to try. Its not all about believing when believing comes hard. Its all about trusting that what little faith you bring to the table is enough, more than enough, the mustard seed of a banquet (and I dont even like mustard).

Youre not very good at this, as you tell yourself and others. You sit there on the sofa in the early morning with your eyes closed, your legs crossed, yearning for the divine, and you immediately think of all the things you need to get done that day, the meeting thats supposed to happen, the e-mails you must send, the person you should talk to, the seminar you forgot to put on the calendar. That reminds you of the person you said you would get together with whom you havent gotten together with just yet, and you want to be perceived as a person of your word, so you feel you should get in touch instead of just letting it go.

Youve only been there on that sofa for less than a minute, the sun barely glimpsed over the horizon, and youre already off to the races, the superego riding its mangy horse, hurtling down a well-traveled track, tossing up dust and mud. You think of the check you need to write, a bill you havent paid; you mentally compute the money in your account, trying to figure out if you can cover it or let it slide. And while youre at it, you wonder how much youve managed to squirrel away in your retirement account and really how much you could take out annually if this stock market continues on its wild roller-coaster ride. Maybe if you were a better money manager you would feel more secure.

Even though this time, this dedicated time, is not about being secure financially; its a moment youve promised yourself to look to higher things, to connect with a higher power. Why are you wasting it worrying about money and the mortgage and your 401(k)? Do you think Jesus really cares about the S&P or the Dow Jones any more than he cares about people who have too little to even invest in a retirement fund?

You dont want to be this way. You wish you could be like the widow with her mighty mite, putting it in the offering plate, hoping not to be noticed, giving all she has out of love and belief.

The only thing you share with her is an abiding humility. You would be as glad not to be noticed in any Heavenly Competition for Radical Holiness. You wouldnt want anyone to think you are bragging, because you have very little to brag about. Just because you said you write about prayerto that person at the dinner party who asked you what kind of things you wroteyou wouldnt want her or anyone else to think youre above the fray. Its not like you dont suffer from the same worries as the rest of us or nurture the same envies or have moments youd rather not mention of woe-begotten shame.

The irony is not lost on you that to be someone who says they write about prayer is to put yourself in an attention-getting realm with holy know-it-all status that is contrary to all that prayer is and does. You dont generally go for people who apologize for who they are before they tell you who they are; their humility is to be as little trusted as the correspondent who signs off, Humbly yours. If you call attention to your humility, how humble can you really be?

You have your doubts about how prayer works, although God forbid you should waste your time identifying them, raising them to an exalted level far beyond their status or worth, because what you really have is belief, and thats what you want to share more than anything else. It was the gift given to you, the pearl beyond price that merits selling all you have and all you possess and it only increases in value as you give it away. It is the most important thing about you. It is your treasure and the source of all you treasure. Something will happen when youre sitting on that couch. In that twenty minutes there will be a glimmer (or there wont) of something far beyond you, a rent in the fabric, a piercing through the veil, an instant of calm, a sign of reassurance, a signal of connection, a peace that passes all understanding, a breath of fresh air, a touch across the cheek, an awakening of the heart, a sigh, a sensation.

Or, as I say, it wont be there. Youre not there for that. Its a bonus, a fringe benefit, as a woman I worked with once said, describing the fur coat she wore, a gift from her husband. I question the merit of surveys on prayers effectiveness in combating a plethora of complaints, from high blood pressure to depression to heart diseaseand hey, Ive known all three. How nice, I think, that someone can find something thats quantifiable about prayer. How great for the whats-in-it-for-me seeker. How illuminating for the science section of the newspaper. But it would be like getting married because youre told that married people live longer, happier, healthier lives than unmarried people, and you feel that you should acquire for yourself the same benefits. What about love? What about heedless passion? What about unbridled fun? (Youre hearing from a man who loves being married.)

I smile when I pray. At least it feels like I do. My body smiles. I dont hold up a mirror to see and Ive never had myself photographed praying, although a young colleague of mine wants to do it for a series of portraits of people in prayer. Im not sure I can pray if I know someone is taking pictures of me, I said. Once a New York Times photographer wanted to do that, take a picture of me praying on the New York City subway because I like to pray on the subway train. I told the man that he could photograph me reading psalms from my little pocket Bibleno problembut he couldnt take a picture of me praying there. It would be phony, a charade, like simulated sex in a Hollywood movie. My eyes closed, my head bowed, Id be listening to the click of the shutter, not God.