Growing up as a fundamentalist Christian, I was taught that God was a literal being in Heaven (although somehow he was also present with me) and that He - always a He - wanted me to pray to Him. For me there were mainly two kinds of prayer. Firstly, there were prayers of thanksgiving and praise, which I was taught God also coveted. These could be prayers that were thankful for a family member getting a new job, or myself receiving a good grade on my latest exam, or a church member receiving healing from a serious physical condition.
Mostly, though, prayer was petitionary in nature - it meant asking God for things. These were the laundry list prayers. Prayers for employment or good grades or healing. They also included prayers pleading God for forgiveness, something I found myself doing often. I was told that of course God was listening to me, although probably 95 per cent or more of my prayers either went unanswered or resulted in God supposedly telling me "No."
Fast forward to today. What does prayer mean, if anything, if I do not believe that God is a literal person in the sky? What does prayer mean if I don't believe there is a being who answers prayers, or who says "No" to them?
Prayer has become very problematic for me. As a child and as a teenager, I found myself on my knees literally hundreds of times, most often asking for things, primarily forgiveness, thinking that I had to be in God's good books. It was as if God was a divine Santa and He kept a naughty and nice list. Only the stakes were much higher, because at the end of life if you found yourself on the naughty list, you would face eternal damnation. At best, if you weren't in God's good graces, he wouldn't answer your prayers or bless you with things. During those years I prayed for my friends and family who were dealing with illness. The vast majority of the time they remained sick. I pleaded with God to take away the personal guilt that I felt after supposedly committing a sin. The vast majority of the time I remained in a pit of overwhelming guilt. I prayed time and time again that God would take me out of the abusive situation that I was living in within my family of origin. God was either deaf or wasn't willing to act on my behalf. All of this puzzled me after reading scriptures that said things like "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened." (Matthew 7: 7-8)
So it was that, just as I was "losing my religion" near the end of my time at Bible college, that I also eventually ditched my belief in a person-type God, and in the efficacy of prayer.
This all leaves me wondering what to make of prayer today as I re-examine the faith.
Firstly, if I don't believe that God is a supernatural type person in the sky, a Santa on steroids if you will, who or what do I believe God to be? My personal answer to this is that rather than believing in supernatural theism today, I look at God through the lens of panentheism, or "everything-in-God." It's a term that the late Jesus scholar Marcus Borg was fond of using. Rather than God being a supernatural man in the sky, God is the Ultimate Reality of love which infuses everyone and everything in creation, and in which everything in creation resides. God is the Spirit in which we "live and move and have our being." I think of God in this respect today. I am a fish in a vast ocean of water. God is the water in which I swim, just as I am made primarily of water, or the God-stuff. Another image that I like is that of a swimmer floating on the water, or being carried by God. The following beautiful poem comes to mind:
The Avowal
As swimmers dare
to lie face to the sky
and water bears them,
as hawks rest upon air
and air sustains them,
so would I learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace.
~ Denise Levertov
Today I tend to believe that, while God is not a literal person, God is still personal, as that great reality in which I live and move and have my being. God is most clearly seen in acts of love.
Because I see God in this way, rather than prayer being a laundry list of petitions, perhaps prayer occurs when I am most attuned with Love. This could be having coffee with a distraught friend, shoveling an elderly neighbour's sidewalk, or visiting a church member in the hospital. Prayer could also mean those meditative times when I stop and slow down and appreciate creation, such as when I walk slowly through the woods and listen to the birds and the wind blowing through the leaves. The apostle Paul's idea of "praying without ceasing" is much more attainable if I view prayer this way. It's not about being on my knees 24/7, it's about being attuned to Love. Also of importance is that if I believe God is within me and not just around me, I must listen to my own inner voice, my own inner promptings, rather than dismissing myself.
What about you? Has prayer meant something to you in the past? Does it currently mean something to you? What does that look like?
Peace to you,
Mark-Andrew
