Rector’s Reflections
Tuesday 8th April 2025
Developing Our Prayer Life: Some ideas from an old book
I thought I hadn’t written about prayer for a while, so this will be my theme in the days ahead. Christians often find prayer difficult, and we can all benefit from learning more about different forms of prayer. Prayer comes in many different types, and different types of prayer will be better suited to particular personalities, as well as the circumstances of our lives at any particular point in time.
I think God doesn’t mind how we pray. The key thing is that we at least try to pray, and we do so in a way which makes sense to us. God wants our prayers to be real – an opportunity to bring before Him whatever is on our hearts and minds, and a chance to be honest with God about how we might be feeling or thinking. It might be that we are angry or have significant doubts about traditional Christian teaching or even about whether God actually exists and whether our prayers make any difference at all. God has given us the ability to feel and express emotion, and the ability to think for ourselves, and so He doesn’t mind when we share our anger or our doubts with Him. We are being truly human, and this must please God very much.
And part of being truly human is that sometimes we are lost for words and sometimes we get distracted and never quite get round to doing what we know we ought to do. We can expect these features of being human to feature in our prayer lives, as well. Sometimes we simply can’t find the words to say what we want to say to God. And sometimes, perhaps often, we are so busy that we never quite get round to saying our prayers at all.
I should add that the problem of being so busy that we forget to pray is nothing new. This has been a problem for Christians down the centuries. Three main responses have been developed to cope with this problem. One is to develop the discipline to carve out some time and space during the day to have at least a few minutes of quality time with God. This might be combined with another activity, for example praying while taking the dog for a walk.
Another response is to delegate the praying to someone else, who might have more time in their lives for prayer, and to ask them to pray for us and our concerns. I think there is nothing in this sort of out-sourced prayer. It helps to develop a web of prayer and mutual support within the Christian community, and this web supports and strengthens the Church. And it can be profoundly moving for a Christian to receive a prayer request from another Christian. A couple of weeks ago, I went on a short visit to Douai Abbey. As I was sitting in the abbey church, the abbot happened to pop in and we got chatting. He then asked me to offer a prayer for him. I was not expecting this: the abbot of a Benedictine monastery sincerely seeking my prayers, simply because I was a fellow Christian and a fellow priest! I was profoundly moved by this experience. You don’t get to be an abbot of a monastery unless you have become a master of the spiritual life – and yet this master of the spiritual life was sincerely asking me if I would offer a prayer for him.
A third approach is to try and keep our prayers as short as possible – short, focussed, and to the point. Such prayers are sometimes called “arrow” prayers. When we’re busy and distracted and don’t have time for anything long-winded, we might just fire off a quick arrow of request to God , along the lines of, “Help me, God!” It might be that we make our arrow prayer slightly longer, perhaps quoting a relevant phrase or verse from the Bible. I often find myself offering up such arrow prayers. But a three word prayer offered with sincerity is just as just as valid as prayers which are much longer. God doesn’t count the words. He’s just happy that we offering up a prayer, whatever form it takes.
There are many other ways in which we can offer up a prayer to God, and in the days ahead I will share some thoughts based on some ideas found in an old book, called The Cuddeson College Office Book . This book was published back in 1940 to help ordinands at Cuddesdon Theological College (now Ripon College Cuddesdon), near Oxford. It was based on an even older collection of prayers. Although this books is now over 80 years old, it is full of spiritual wisdom and helpful suggestions as to how we might develop our prayer lives. I look forward to sharing some its ideas in the days ahead.