But What is Prayer...






Today I learned of three separate incidences of people I know who are in turmoil; in pain either physical or emotional or both. Please don’t offer me your thoughts and prayers, this has nothing to do with me. It has to do with us as species because we are all connected in some indescribable way. I am convinced of this. Life is so incredibly short, fragile, and unpredictable. Yet we act as if it is not. None of us—not one single one of us—will make it out of this life alive, nor do anyone of us know that we will wake up in the morning. So shouldn’t it make sense to be nice and care about one another? And wouldn’t it make sense to pray more often? Real prayer, not sending empty “thoughts and prayers.” By this I do not mean hands clasped and looking upward (though that is okay as well), but more so looking inward and realizing that you and I and everyone is not that much different. Helping one another, telling someone you love them, or just listening; that is a form of prayer in action. And that, I truly believe, is the prayer that the Universe hears loud and clear (and sometimes answers with tears). This photo was taken at a rally in downtown Buffalo a couple years ago. It was a rally for someone’s rights; I can’t remember...immigrant’s rights, LGTBQ rights, women’s rights. There have been so many rallies. It seems silly that we still need to rally about anyone's rights. Cut my skin and it bleeds the same as an immigrant’s, gay person’s, black, brown, or checkerboard person’s. I’ll get off my little soapbox now.

“The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.” ― Soren Kierkegaard

Comments