Prayers

I just about sent one of my co-workers into shock the other day. Poor woman was on her way out the door when I asked her how she was.

"Excellent!" came her reply, then I serenaded her with a portion of of a tune I had learned in Cursillo:

How Excellent! How Excellent! How Excellent is thy Name Oh Lord..."

Poor woman went into shock! How in the world would would some slightly demented white Episcopalian guy know the words and the tune to a song she had been singing for years in her own little black Baptist Church?

"You know that song?" She was in a state of disbelief.

I shared with her the fact that I had attended a renewal weekend called Cursillo, learned a whole bunch of neat songs (wrote one, too), and was generally aware of the spirituality of the people around me. What I didn't tell her was that there was at least one other person in the building who had been to a similar weekend (Walk to Emmaus) at my suggestion, or that I managed to get my wife to go just this past September, or that I had a whole bunch of friends with whom I share this neat little quirk. I would dare say that a good third to half of my friends on Facebook have attended either Cursillo or one of the similar renewal weekends.

It's rather infectious, you know.

One does not have to attend a renewal weekend to have the Spirit with them and/or to know some of the Truths we learned. One of the Truths is that prayer works. One of my friends posted: "Prayer should be a first response, not a last resort". I wrote back: "Prayer works best when applied early and often".

The lovely Miss Carol and I discussed prayer and prayed together from pretty much the start of our relationship. Yes, early... and pretty much often. I got her a cell phone just so she and I could talk and pray together nightly - got her a Book of Common Prayer, too, which we also use from time to time in settings other than Church. We also had some fairly deep discussions as to the efficacy of prayer. We both came to the conclusion that prayers are answered, although not always in the way we would like to have them answered.

Perhaps some pray for the wrong outcome or for the wrong reason. A little kid praying for a pony comes to mind. It's one of those deals where it's sad that a child (or for that matter, an adult) will pray for something long and hard and be disappointed when that prayer is seemingly not answered. How many people become disenchanted with the idea of God when something bad happens in their life? When the pony doesn't magically appear, or dad or grandma dies when the child is at an impressionable age?

Jan Karon in her Mitford series of books gives her Father Tim the "Prayer that never fails": "Thy Will Be Done". It is perhaps the most effective prayer I know of. We're not asking for a particular outcome, we're just trying to determine what is in store for us as we move through this mortal coil... and it works all the time.

Carol and I have been working the prayer thing a bit harder than normal lately. Tis the cancer, you see. She had been to see her Doctor earlier in the day and the news wasn't quite as hopeful as we had wanted it to be. It's going to be double instead of a single mastectomy and chemotherapy has been prescribed. Bummer. I did promise, though that I would shave my head and wear one of those funky pink hats, provided that one is found to fit my head. I'm hard to fit for hats.

On the other hand, we are blessed. We have an army of prayer warriors behind us. Cursillo folks and Walk to Emmaus folks and Church people (from a whole bunch of Churches) and family and extended family... I could type on this list for an hour and still miss several dozen people. The two of us had started early and often - and we have already felt the power. Doesn't matter who we are, white, black, yellow, brown or slightly tinged with green (as Carol was the other night-the dye used by the Doctor to isolate a lymph node, you see), we are united because we support each other when we need that support.

So I just about sent a co-worker into shock for knowing what she assumed was a gospel song known only to her and her Churchmates. She recovered. Carol will recover.

Stay Tuned.

Be Seeing You!