Solace

I believe that prayer should be seen as something that can work wonders in the heart of the person praying.

When one prays: 'God, give me strength', we can feel strengthened indeed.

When one prays: 'Thy will be done' one can achieve acceptance of what is to happen.

What I DO NOT BELIEVE IN, is prayer as a sort of "letter to Santa".

eg. 'Lord, let me have this', and 'Lord, give me that.'

A common example of this is before athletic events when some athletes kneel down and pray for victory. (when both sides are praying to win, why would God choose one over the other!!!???

Thank you all for sharing your thoughts on this very personal topic.

In today's world it seems that all you read is about how we are seperated from one another by our beliefs and it often seems that prayer has a limited definition.

It is comforting to know that there are others, like me, who use the word outside of its usual scope.

boomerang ~ I'm sorry. For your friend and his wife. What a time they both must be going through. I can't imagine.

I am not religiously inclined, although I do pray. Doesn't matter to me where my prayers go.....I just believe that they're being heard and hopefully considered.

I have my own personal prayer list ~ it's a mile long, if not more. But, I don't delegate my prayers to nightly rituals ~ I think about everyone on my prayer list throughout my day.....and hopefully into the night.

solace
Boomerang, as an atheist I do not believe there is anyone or anything to hear or answer prayers, whether of gratitude or petition. Nevertheless, when my wife was dying in the hospital, I found myself frequently in the hospital chapel engaged in a kind of prayer. For reasons I do not understand it gave solace.

I guess in a sense I pray. I always say "I'll send some good vibes" and spend time doing what some would call postitive visualization. Of course, "good vibes" wouldn't really work with people who's wives are dying. Sorry to hear about it Boomer.

Prayer is hope.
Visualization helps us perform better, with direct, effective action, well-rehearsed.

A conscious form of hope.
Taking time to think, with intention, makes things clear.
It builds and carries awareness.

A form of hope that we communicate, to ourselves.
Becoming clear about it, we can then share the results with others.

Prayer has little to do with God,
but with our own values, intention, destiny and dreams.

Because deliberate dreams become real.

My friend stopped by work today to talk. His wife has been diagnosed with a very invasive for of cancer and she is not expected to survive more than a few months.

My friend is my age, early 40s and has two young children. Needless to say, he is freaking out.

Of course I offered my sympathy and help and prayers.

My friend is a Christian; I am not. We know this about each other.

Still, we embraced and he welcomed my prayers saying "That is all I need."

This exchange made me thing about prayer in a way that I hadn't before.

Now I'm curious as to how others think of prayer.

I would love to hear what you belive is the nature of prayer.