4 Misconceptions of Personal Prayer
You’re a cradle Catholic. You’ve been told that prayer is important. So you get on your knees on your bedside and recite the rosary. You want to get a routine started. But, after a few weeks, you notice that the ritual is really boring and repetitive. And you’re tired after work and studying, so you stop. You try to pick it up again later in the year but fail again.
What went wrong? Was it discipline or willpower? Or perhaps there were a few misconceptions about what prayer was that stopped you from experiencing it as it really is…
The Personal and the Communal
First, I need to clarify what I mean when I say “prayer”. In this article, I want to focus on personal prayer as opposed to communal prayer.
Communal prayers are done in groups, whether it be the mass or saying the divine office or the rosary together.
Personal prayer, on the other hand, refers to a one-on-one conversation with God. Something that is done in solitude. One mind to another. One heart to another. One soul to another.
Why Personal Prayer?
The question now comes: Why should I pray on my own time?
The answer is simple: Because, as Christians, that is the core of our faith.
The core of our faith is and always has been Jesus Christ. The Gospels are basically the story of how God, who is love, came down to meet us! He encounters us, he talks to us, he looks into us with loving eyes and calls us by name. Peter, John, Paul… Everyone that Jesus meets has a unique relationship with him. And when Jesus meets someone, his life changes.
We too have this same privilege of meeting him every day, in prayer.
Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.
- Pope Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est
4 Misconceptions (and Truths!) of Prayer
Misconception 1: Prayer is “for God”
Before my conversion, I merely attended Sunday mass and never prayed on my own time. Implicitly, I thought my faith was a collection of rules — a list of things to check off. Prayer was “demanded by God”. Prayer was like paying taxes to the government, a duty to a higher power so it doesn’t totally demolish you. And so, I merely followed along and “fulfilled my obligations”.
Behind all these lay my false assumption of who God was. In my view, God was a jealous tyrant who needed our praise and adulation to feel good. He was not the God of tender mercy. Not the God who knelt to wash men’s feet. Not the God who died for us.
Truth 1: Prayer is for US! It is profoundly for us!
In Acts 4: 1–3, 23–31, it goes:
The priests and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to Peter and John while they were speaking to the people. They were greatly disturbed because the apostles were teaching the people, proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead. They seized Peter and John and, because it was evening, they put them in jail until the next day…
On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people and reported all that the chief priests and the elders had said to them. When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God.
“Sovereign Lord,” they said, “you made the heavens and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David:
“‘Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed one.
Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.
After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.
What do we notice here? Pope Benedict XVI says : “When the first Christian community is confronted by dangers, difficulties and threats it does not attempt to work out how to react, find strategies, defend itself or what measures to adopt; rather, when it is put to the test, the community starts to pray and makes contact with God.” And by putting themselves in prayer, the disciples were consoled and strengthened.
Encountering trouble? Run after Jesus! He is the healer and refuge for you in tough times. Pope Francis says that when we really listen to him, the Lord surprises us, “the clouds disappear, doubts give way to truth, fears to serenity.”
Prayer is for us. It helps us in our human weakness. In prayer, we are able to commune with love himself: Jesus. We are able to receive his consolations and we are further strengthened for the journey ahead. Indeed, “when we give our problems to Jesus, he puts his peace in our hearts”.
Instead of being the last resort, prayer should become our first instinct. Not because God needs or demands it, but because by doing so, we find refuge in Jesus!
Misconception 2: Prayer is “saying the perfect words”
Coming from Catholic schools, parishes and families that emphasised strong communal prayers, I had a very mistaken misconception that prayer had to be perfect. Prayers during morning assemblies had to be vetted by teachers. Set prayers based on the immaculate Psalms gave me the impression that if I prayed, I had to be a poet of the highest caliber. The perfect Catholic was one who memorised the Apostle’s Creed, Hail Holy Queen, Memorare, etc…
I thought that God was only interested in hearing the “good stuff” from us. He was only interested in words that made him look great. If I had a problem or I was angry or frustrated, I never thought to bring it to God. Why would he care? God was impersonal and uncaring.
Truth 2: Prayer is “real talk” with Jesus
What can the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13–35) tell us about prayer?
Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.
He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”
They stood still, their faces downcast. One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”
“What things?” he asked.
“About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”
He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.
As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”
They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.
In this Gospel, we see Jesus in conversation with his disciples. His disciples come into his presence totally absorbed with their own troubles and they pour their hearts out unto Jesus. Jesus asks them some questions, taking the time to listen. Eventually, the disciples calm down and Jesus explains their situation to them. At the end, the disciples cannot bear Jesus leaving and they realise that they were in the presence of the Christ: “Were not our hearts burning within us?”
This is what prayer looks like.
Jesus cannot love someone that doesn’t exist. If you do not present your authentic self but keep putting up shields and false images of yourself, Jesus cannot love you as you are.
A prayer is a conversation with a friend. It is about being “raw” with Jesus. If you want to get to know him, you have to talk! And you have to talk from the heart.
Some spiritual writers recommend a mechanical division of the hour into four parts: thanksgiving, petition, adoration, reparation. This is unnecessarily artificial. An hour’s conversation with a friend is not divided into four rigid segments or topics. The Holy Hour is not an official prayer; it is personal.
- Fulton Sheen
As indicated by the Venerable Fulton Sheen, throw out the routine if it hinders your “real talk” with Jesus! Instead, pick up a journal and start talking about how your day was. Come to Jesus with your hurts and your sorrows. As St. Philip Neri says, “During mental prayer, it is well, at times, to imagine that many insults and injuries are being heaped upon us, that misfortunes have befallen us.”
Note: Remember here that I am referring to personal prayer. Routine set prayers are quite essential to communal prayer, so don’t throw that out!
Misconception 3: Prayer is Boring
Repetitive. Ritualistic. Motion and movement.
There is no love in that.
Growing up, the expectation for my faith was centred around showing up. As long as I showed up and performed certain actions and rituals, then I could go home — I wouldn’t be questioned at all. With the exterior in place, the interior mattered little. For me, Catholicism was like learning drills from my sergeant. And no one loves his drill sergeant.
Truth 3: Prayer is letting Jesus look at you with eyes of love
The story of the rich young man (Mark 10: 20–22):
Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”
Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
Often in this Gospel, we focus on the young man asking Jesus what he had to do to possess eternal life and him walking away after Jesus asks him to follow. However, we skip over the most important line: “Jesus looked at him and loved him.” Whenever Jesus calls you to follow him, he first looks at you with eyes of love.
As you learn to immerse yourself in prayer, learning to show your real self before Jesus, you will slowly learn to hear a voice, an intuition, a sensing saying: “You are loved. You are accepted. Accept the fact that you are accepted.”
Prayer becomes more and more a way to listen to the blessing… when I go to a quiet place to pray, I realise that, although I have a tendency to say many things to God, the real “work” of prayer is to become silent and listen to the voice that says good things about me… to trust that I will hear a voice of blessing.”
When we pray, we allow ourselves to be in sweet union with Jesus. We become one with him — love personified. St. John Vianney said that, “Prayer is the inner bath of love into which the soul plunges itself.”
For the great mystics of the church, the love that envelopes them is the stuff of legend. St. Catherine of Siena was once so absorbed in prayer that even the sharpest of needles plunged into her skin could not make her flinch. And here’s an account of St. John Paul II’s ecstatic union with Jesus:
“His head was bowed and he was absorbed in prayer, totally immobile, without even the slightest movement. He was in a sort of trance — or I dare say, ecstasy… I had a clear sensation that I was observing someone endowed with a spiritual power that was no longer human; someone who no longer belonged to this world, but was living those minutes in complete communion with God, with the saints, and with all the souls in heaven. The unreal sparkle of the snow all around emphasised this impression. A complete silence had descended. Everything was motionless… He never moved so much as a millimeter, his muscles were motionless.”
Fall in love. Stay in love.
Misconception 4: Prayer is Domestic
In my church, there was a group of prayer warriors who went to every mass and rosary session. The vast majority of them were elderly. This gave me an impression that prayer was something docile. Something that might sooth and calm — not something for an active man like me who wanted to make change and move.
Truth 4: Prayer is the Explosive Power Source of all Mission
The Gospel tells us otherwise. In Luke 6:12–19:
“Now it happened in those days that Jesus went onto the mountain to pray, and he spent the whole night in prayer to God. When day came, he summoned his disciples and picked out twelve of them and called them apostles: Simon, whom he called Peter; and his brother, Andrew; James; John; Philip; Bartholomew; Matthew; Thomas; James, son of Alphaeus; Simon, called the Zealot; Judas, son of James; and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.
“He then came down with them and stopped at a piece of level ground where there was a large gathering of his disciples. There was a great crowd of people from all parts of Judea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon, who had come to hear him and be cured of their diseases. And people tormented by unclean spirits were also cured. Everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all”
According to Henri Nouwen, Jesus establishes the correct sequence those in work and ministry. So often, we rush out to work in the world or serve in church first, only to realise that we need people to help us. Lastly, only in dire straits do we turn to God.
Instead, Nouwen observes, Jesus did the exact opposite. He regularly retreated to places where he could pray by himself and establish contact with his Father. Strengthened by the grace received in prayer, he could then establish a community of disciples and then head with them on mission.
Prayer is always the first thing. Through prayer, we give ourselves to God, “who is able, through his mighty power already at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think” (Eph 3:20). We tap into our life-force and gain strength and energy to continue the journey. We retreat to advance.
While it is a calming exercise, prayer is more than that. It’s actually the driving force behind the movement that Jesus Christ started — the movement that continues till this day in the church.
One of my favourite saints, St. Benedict, exemplified this pattern. St. Benedict lived at the time of the collapse of the Roman Empire. While doing his studies in Rome he became disgusted with life there and left to dwell in a cave for three years. Three years. He immersed himself in prayer and from that kid emerged the Benedictine Monasteries, the institution responsible for the preservation of Roman and Greek philosophy and the basis for the resuscitation of Europe. St. Benedict found God first, then allowed God to work through him to build, move and change. Retreat… to advance.
Without Prayer nothing good is done. God’s works are done with our hands joined, and on our knees. Even when we run, we must remain spiritually kneeling before Him.
- St. Luigi Orione
Conclusion
It has been my hope that this article has allowed prayer to take a whole new dimension for you. I pray with Mary, our Mother, that you will get on your knees in sweet adoration, committing your life more and more to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Remember: Prayer is for you. Prayer is conversing with God. Prayer is being loved. And prayer is your power source.
Man is worth as much as he prays.
- St. Luigi Orione
