Which Style of Prayer Is Better?

Rev. Joseph Awtowi

We all know that many books have been written about prayer. I wonder why! Is it because it is such a difficult thing to do? Or is it because it is so complicated? I dare say that perhaps so much has been written about prayer because we do not really know what prayer is and we surely do not know how to pray aright. Lauren points out that there are many styles of prayer, and she has dabbled in almost all [page 53]. Why would she dabble in all? Is it because she did not find any style as satisfying as the one with which she had grown up? Is it because she did not find any style fulfilling an inner need? How can we pray aright?
Having learned as a young Christian that prayer is “conversation with God,” I bought into the idea that the better prayer is spontaneous prayer. Lauren gives an example of her friend Meg who commented on non-spontaneous prayer that, “Instead of expressing my innermost feelings to God I was just reciting a bunch of old prayers by rote.” In support of spontaneous prayer one may ask, who writes down their conversation with their parent or friend prior to the time of conversation? In “my old age” I am doing more of “liturgical prayer” than I did in my younger years. I pray that is not perceived as having lost my zeal. It seems that the Jew Jesus who said that, “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know” followed the traditional Jewish style of praying - reciting the prayers of the hours. We know the disciples did. Two of them encountered a paralyzed man at the Temple gate as they were going in for the three o’clock afternoon prayer. I, like Lauren and many Christians, find that there are times that my mouth is uttering words but my brain is on something else. I like to think that the prayers of liturgy act like the soil or fertilizer in which are planted those wayward thoughts as genuine heartfelt prayers. Would it not be true to say that when we are praying the liturgy all that we think is prayer?
I take great comfort in the fact that when people have Alzheimer or for whatever reason are unable to recollect the names of dear ones, they can say the Apostles’ Creed or the Lord’s Prayer without missing a beat. I see that as a rationale for encouraging reciting prayers. At least at those times when I cannot pray with my rational mind I can still pray. An important question is not which style of prayer is better; it is “what is the purpose of prayer?” Is it to tell the all-knowing God what God already knows? The good news is that God “hears” our prayer – spontaneous or by rote; and we are formed (prayerfully TRANSformed) as we pray – by rote or spontaneous; and we can offer all our thoughts to God as prayer.