Prayer changes nothing - and everything

Pentecost XIX - Proper 24 - October 20, 2019

Christ Episcopal Church, Milford, De

Everything I learned about praying always and not losing heart, I learned from two very different people at two very different stages in my life.

You are not going to be surprised to hear this, but the first person to teach me about prayer was my Grandmother. You think the persistent widow in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 18:1-8) is persistent? Ha! She had nothing on my Grandmother! In fact, I’m told that the best translation of the phrase, “she will wear me out etc." is actually a boxing term in Greek for giving someone a black eye. 

Yup, that would be my Grandmother.

When you walked into my Grandmother’s house, you couldn’t help but see the two pictures of the two men my Grandmother considered “The World’s Greatest Roman Catholics.” 

The first was Jesus. I know, right? Who knew Jesus was Roman Catholic? I thought he was Jewish. The picture was what we kids called his “High School Graduation” picture. You know, the one of him in profile, with his long hair beautifully combed, and the perfect back-lighting? 

The other picture of the other great Catholic? Oh, that would have been John F. Kennedy, Jr. Of course.  Yes, she did have a picture of the Pope. It was in the bathroom. I never dared asked why.

Walking into my Grandmother’s bedroom was like walking into a shrine – we kids used to call it “Disney World for Roman Catholics”. If you didn’t grow up Roman Catholic, you might not understand, but let me try to describe it to you, anyway.

Oh, and, just in case there’s any question or doubt: I cherish my Roman Catholic upbringing as I do my Portuguese heritage and I mean absolutely no disrespect to either. This is part of what makes me uniquely me – warts and all – and I am deeply grateful for it all.

So, to my grandmother’s house. The tops of all of her bureaus were filled with statues of saints, all of which had small, flickering votive or novena candles in front of them. If you lifted up each statue, underneath them, written in Portuguese, was a slip of paper with her particular prayer petitions to that particular saint.

In my Grandmother’s world of prayer, one prayed to particular saints for particular things. St. Jude, of course, was the saint of Lost Causes. You prayed to him if you needed a Big Phat M.I.R.A.C.L.E. Maybe someone was gravely ill? In the hospital? Maybe he or she had (said in a whisper, lest on one else should get it…. shhhh . . . .) cancer? Better petition St. Jude.

St. Joseph was patron saint of Workers. Joe was your guy if your husband or sons or brothers were out of work or there was a strike at the factory. Joe would get them back to work, right quick.  The BVM (Blessed Virgin Mary) was the one you turned to if your novena prayers had not yet been answered. My Grandmother figured that Mary had the ear of both God AND Jesus, so if you prayed to her, you knew one of the two guys were going to hear about it, big time.

There were lots and lots of others – St. Martin de Porres, St. Theresa of Avila, St. Lucy, St. Elizabeth of Portugal (+ my patron saint), Mother Elizabeth Seaton, to name just a few, but the busiest saint was always St. Gerard, the patron saint of families. He was also the one in the most trouble for not answering my Grandmother’s prayers.

If you were a saint, and my Grandmother prayed to you – hwever many prescribed decades on her rosary for the prescribed amount of days or weeks or months – and you didn’t answer her prayer, you were in BIG trouble.

My grandmother would first yell at the statue. Then, she would blow out the candle. Then, with a great flourish, she would turn the statue to face the wall, saying to him or her in broken English, “And, you gonna stay there until you gonna answer my prayer.”

So, I learned three important lessons about prayer from my Grandmother

First lesson: God is always watching. Never let God catch you not praying.

Second lesson: Don’t put all your prayers in one basket. Spread them around.

Third lesson: If your prayers aren’t answered, pray harder. Louder. Like you mean it.

And then, I grew up.  I learned stuff about the world. I learned that the world I lived in was very different from my grandmother’s world. It was a world she couldn’t have even imagined much less live in, so she kept more and more to herself, speaking only Portuguese. As my world expanded, her world grew smaller and smaller. It was safer for her that way.

Even as my Grandmother retreated from the world, I ran straight to it and found myself moving farther and farther away from the images of God of my childhood. Those images simply didn’t have any relevance to the world in which I was living. 

I discovered that God was not a puppet master, pulling every one and every thing on a string. I learned that God didn’t cause tornadoes and hurricanes and tidal waves – the shifting earth did that. Smokey the Bear taught me that only I could prevent forest fires – not the wrath of God. 

I learned that people had heart attacks and strokes and diabetes and even ‘cancer’ because of hereditary and environmental and nutritional considerations, and not because God punished them for sin. I learned that left-handed people were not sinister, that people with seizure disorder (epilepsy) were not possessed by demons, that women with normal menstrual cycles were not ‘unclean’, and that children born blind or deaf or with a deformity were not evidence that their ancestors had sinned.

For a very long time, all of that knowledge put me in a tailspin crisis of faith. Now that I knew all this stuff about the world, what was I supposed to believe about God?

Well, I learned that my faith didn’t have to stay in a childhood fantasy box. I learned that my faith could grow and adapt and change in order to meet the challenges of the world. I learned to take the lessons I needed to learn from the faith my grandmother in order to live my own life, in my own time, in the world where God had placed me. 

It wasn’t until I met a second person in my adult life that I was able to articulate what I knew about prayer and bring it to yet another level.  That person was Bishop Jack Spong.

I had been working for Jack as Canon Missioner for about three years when I discovered a lump in my right breast. The doctor thought it was probably benign but, as he said, “You and I will both sleep better once that lump is out.” 

So, two days before my surgery, I went to my bishop to tell him and to ask him for his prayers.

Jack listened very carefully, as he is wont to do, and then, pastor that he is, he assured me of his prayers. 

Scholar that he is, he also could not resist asking me a question. 

“Elizabeth," he said, “of course I will pray for you, but, you know, people come to me – as I’m sure they come to you – as if your prayers were some sort of magic. I want you to know that, if it were in my power to cure you of any cancer, of course I would. But you know, and I know, that neither you nor I are that powerful. So, when you ask me to pray for you, what are you asking, really?”

Well, it was the first time I had ever really thought about that. Jack has been called a heretic and an atheist. I can assure you that he is not an atheist. He's more of a modern mystic. And, I’ve come to learn that the people I trust most in the church – people who believe in God and love Jesus and trust the Holy Spirit – are often what many in the church consider heretics. I’ve discovered that that says more about them than what is true about Jack or any heretic. 

Jack has a way of challenging what you say you believe – not so you believe like him – but so that you can better articulate what you believe. He respects differences and won't hesitate to tell you why he thinks you're wrong. Always a good bishop, he just wants to make sure you can articulate why you believe what you say you believe.

I heard myself say to him that when I am anxious or afraid, I often feel much worse because I think I’m all alone in whatever situation or crisis I’ve found myself. I imagine that, in this world, we are all standing on an interconnected web, and each one of us has his or her own thread. 

When I’m anxious or afraid, it gets very dark which makes me feel even more afraid and alone. When I know someone is praying for me or with me, it’s like a light is turned on, and I can see others around me, lifting me up, holding me up in their prayer, and I’m less afraid.

Jack listened very carefully, nodded his head and smiling, said, “What I’ve discovered is that prayer is a paradox - something that contains two opposite statements, both of which are true.”

“Prayer,” he said, “doesn’t change anything. And, prayer changes everything.”

“Mostly, prayer changes everything, because prayer changes me. It changes my focus. It makes me less self-centered. It makes me care more about others. And, it makes me aware that I am part of a vast, interconnected network and I’m not alone. People who have come before, people who are here, now, and people who are yet to come are all standing with me. That Jesus is with me because I am with others and they are with me.”

"So,” he said, “Why don’t we pray together, right now?”

And, we did. We held hands. We prayed. Right then. Right there. In his office. No vestments. No saints. No votive lights. No little slips of paper with petitions on them. No prayer beads. And, it was holy. And, it was right. And, it was good. And, I did not lose heart. 

Well, I came through the surgery with flying colors and a benign pathology report. I also came through with a deeper appreciation for the lessons my grandmother taught me about prayer, which I have adapted to suit the world I live in. In my life. In my time. I share them with you as a present.

First lesson: Pray always and without ceasing. Make everything you do be a prayer. If you are mowing the lawn or raking leaves or making applesauce or starting your day of work, dedicate whatever you are doing. Make it a prayer to God.

Second lesson: Pray through a variety of sources and means, without judgment. Whether you use prayer beads or candles or chant, all of it is prayer. When I am on pilgrimage in Palestine this January, I will carry each one of you with every step I take because, for me, I pray best with my boots on and my sleeves rolled up. If someone tells you that they are sitting Zazen for you, or they lay hands on you and speak in tongues, accept it as prayer without judgment. Everyone prays in his or her own way. It's all prayer. It's all good. I mean that: It’s all good.

            Third lesson: Pray expectantly, hopefully, persistently, and never lose heart.  Know that we are all interconnected in an amazing network of relationships. And, we are all connected to a great mystery that scripture calls “a great cloud of witnesses.” People who have gone before us and people who are waiting to be with us along with the people you love who are near or far from you are also in that cloud. The church calls it “the mystic sweet communion” which we call upon when we make Eucharist together. We are never alone.

Pray always and do not lose heart because prayer is a paradox. Prayer changes nothing. And, prayer changes absolutely everything. Prayer changes the question, often from “Why me? Why now?” to “Okay, me. What now?”

And, most importantly, prayer changes the one who prays. I’ve learned that courage is just fear that you walk through, anyway.

Pray always and do no lose heart because prayer changes me and prayer changes you, so that, no matter what life throws at us, our faith is strengthened and our relationship with God is deeper.

Amen.

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