WHAT IS PRAYER?

“Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view.” Ralph Waldo Emerson.

It is nearly impossible for me to define or make sense of prayer anymore. During my younger days, I was sure I knew what prayer was. For a long time, prayer was me asking God what I wanted or needed for me and others as God-centric as possible. What amounted to prayer as supplication and petition was viewed as a lifeline to sustain life and make life abundant. Then, prayer was about joining God in God’s work in seeking God’s glory. I treated prayer as a spiritual weapon to engage in spiritual warfare against the darkness and usher in God’s light-filled kingdom on this earth. This form of prayer paired especially well with my missions engagement. In broad stroke, prayer evolved from “man” focused to God-focused over the years.

While I still value, hold merit to both (as the Bible encourages and commands us), and practice both, prayer for me foundationally has become all about listening and seeing—the act of paying attention. The objects of attention are multipronged: self, God, others, and the world that is both near and far. The attention is almost always present-focused. While reflecting on the past and ruminating about the future are helpful, they tend to be more of a mental exercise or even chatter, not necessarily grounding. As such, it is never a neat endeavor, impossible to come to clear-cut conclusions every single time. In the very process of paying attention, I am sensitized and changed by having to discern what God may be doing. The word may is key because I hold my discernment loosely as it forces me to continue seeking.

Emerson’s rumination of prayer is avuncular and attractive. Contemplation is a way of seeing—“a long loving look at the Real.” It mirrors how God would see us and the world, lovingly and long-ly. What is Real is the present of what is happening now, not in my mind’s quarters as helpful and insightful as they may be. The “facts of life” contain everything: my and others’ needs, the world’s hunger and sufferings, healing and restoration, hope and vigor, as well as warfare and battles. Life is all of these things, irresistibly sweet and unbelievably difficult. Then the last phrase, “from the highest point of view,” exhorts us to detach ourselves from human and earthly fixations, preoccupations, and controls and puts us squarely in the realm of the heavenly as how God would see it. We are to see how God would see, thus joining God in our prayers and actions. The detachment is not an aloof disengagement but a loving engagement from on high.

Consider Mary Oliver's words regarding Emerson's impact on her life.

This[1] is the crux of Emerson, who does not advance straight ahead but wanders to all sides of an issue; who delivers suggestions with a kindly gesture—who opens doors and tells us to look at things for ourselves. The one thing he is adamant about is that we should look—we must look—for that is the liquor of life, that brooding upon issues, that attention to thought even as we weed the garden or milk the cow.

Tangentially speaking, milking the cow takes anywhere from 5 to 7 minutes (if by machine) or 20 to 30 minutes (if by hand) two or three times a day. The majority of a cow’s daily life is filled with grazing, meandering, regurgitating, and simply standing around and seemingly doing nothing. The “purpose” of dairy cows is to produce milk. The truth of the matter is that a cow needs all day and night to produce, not only during the actual milking but during all other non-milking activities and “non-activities.” One cannot accuse the cows to stop standing around and start producing milk. Therein lies the perennial truth of not needing or seeking straight answers, instead suggesting the very need for “wandering.”

According to Oliver, Emerson’s adamance of looking (should and must) is a gem of truth as uncomfortable as the adamance is. This looking, what Emerson calls the liquor of life (I love that expression), is identical to a “long loving look” and of what contemplation is about. One other thing: the encouragement to look at things for ourselves (neither from someone else’s perspective nor with someone else’s convictions) is a stunning insight.

Over the weekend, we took a short flight to Singapore. Along with a few deepening fellowships over meals, we were asked to speak to a group of 10 Singaporean couples (right around our age bracket) who have known each other for more than two decades. This was the first time where I was asked to speak and interact with earnest and devout Catholics. After a sumptuous home-cooked potluck meal, my wife and I shared our life and faith journey with them, painting in broad strokes how we got to where we are. We were quickly reminded that as life has both personal and universal features, a few universal nuggets of our stories connected with them. Then during the second half of our time, I facilitated the time of “looking, wandering, brooding, and paying attention” and sharing regarding what is Real using a series of questions. During Q & A time afterward, one of the participants proposed whether we would be willing to come back and lead a longer (two nights and three days) retreat, going through similar but deeper reflections with more generous time. My quick Enneagram type 7 mouth responded, “I am already there” while peeking at my wife causing the group to laugh out loud. After our interaction time, we were served local delicacies for dessert and some fine wine recommended by the host husband. The wine and the company as the liquor of life sealed my memory of the evening. What fine contemplation!

This process of contemplation (or prayer if you like) ultimately is not about us (though we are included thankfully), but for the sake of others and the world. This is where contemplation always triggers necessary and thoughtful action and through action and engagement, more necessary contemplation until we breathe our last breath. Thus, action and contemplation or contemplation and action go together. One does not and cannot exist without the other. Jesus is the standard bearer and the perfect embodiment of prayer and action.

[1] According to earlier sentences, she speaks of Emerson’s keen gift of exhortation of not “bending toward the narrow and the absolute but to the extravagant and the possible.” That answers are no part of it.