Power of prayer?

[gregw74]

I’ve had some recent troubles with comprehending our need to pray for others. Though I know this may sound cold, it’s the mystery of prayer’s power that’s crippling me.

Respectfully, in the end–it’s always God’s will no matter what. Though, I don’t have a problem with this, I don’t see how our prayers are going to influence God in one direction or another. Is He not unchanging in all eternity in what he permits and does not permit. Furthermore, if God under his own power cannot make us love Him, or even bend our will as He (or we) might prefer, how is it possible that human prayer can accomplish this?

Granted, I suppose I can see how our free personal submission and obedience to God can change our view or perception of such things through prayer and in turn better align our thoughts and actions with that of God’s, but how is it that our prayers can alter the lives of others who are set in their ways for one reason or another, by their own free will that only they control. If God has already planned to work in the lives of those we pray for, won’t he do so anyway; how He wishes, with who He wishes, and when He wishes. Since when does God require our permission to achieve His will, or to dispense grace to those who require it? What use is our prayer for them as it would seem better that we simply pray for ourselves so that we might be a better influence in our own actions and devotion for those people we influence in our immediate life and those later in life.

Is some one’s conversion, or some one’s healing contingent on our fallible discipline of prayer and fasting? Would St. Augustine come to conversion without St. Monica’s prayers? …or was this the eventual coincidence of God’s will with St. Monica’s? Wouldn’t God have brought St. Augustine to conversion anyway? How can it be true that the eternal souls of others lie in our fallible hands? It just seems like the eternal destiny of any number of people is dependent on our devotion and love of God.

This quandary of doubt is not something I’ve welcomed upon myself, in fact I hate it, but it’s only been compounded by one of the messages of Mary at Fatima.

"…Pray, pray a great deal and make sacrifices for sinners. So many souls go to hell because there is no one to pray or make sacrifices for them.”

If Mary is speaking absolutely and saying that these souls have gone to hell because they’ve had no one to pray for them, then why should we pray for such souls, it’s too late. Should she have said “…so many souls are heading towards hell”? If that were the case, such a statement would have at least opened the possibility that prayer will prevent them from ending up in hell. It’s like asking for something after the fact, or maybe a little too late at best? Are the angels and saints in heaven not aware that these souls need such prayer? Have all the prayers for sinners, the Hail Mary’s etc, past, present, and future not been enough? If Mary’s message is true, then it’s fairly clear that our fallible and unreliable abilities in prayer are sending a great number of people to hell. This makes no sense to me.

If anyone can suggest some further reading, or books that might shine some light on prayer and God’s will, I would certainly appreciate it.

Thank you and God bless,
Greg

 

[blessedstar]

Your thoughts are thoughts shared by many.

Prayer is as you know a loving conversation between friends, you and God. By praying we invite God into our lives and God brings us into His life by grace. We have the free will to live our lives on earth with God or we can choose not to be with God and the only way that our lives will increase in deeper union with God is to pray and deepen our faith by prayer. It is by prayer that we become Christ like and good Christians, the highest prayer being the Holy Mass and so with prayer we may do good by God’s grace. We must do our part in our own salvation and the salvation of others, this is what Love does. Love acts in love for others and we are to live in love to live in God Who is Love.

If when we pray all we ever do is make prayers of petition, that is asking God to help in our needs and those of others, then our loving relationship with God is not developing as well as it could do. We need to pray much deeper than this. It is good and it is a spiritual work of mercy to pray for others (prayers of petition) but this must not be the only prayer we make.

In the deepening of our prayer life we grow to understand the intimate level at which God dwells with us and in us and also in others. We realise then that in all things we must turn to God first and this is what we do when we pray for others and ourselves when we see or have a need (prayer of petition). Here we see that the deepening prayer life enhances the simple prayers of petition we make. We realise that no-one can exist without God’s love and care to their full potential. But what changes in the prayers of petition is that we cease to ask for specific solutions such as ‘God let me get the job at the factory because it is close to my house and then I can get rid of my car and save alot of money and Mum will be happier if I work closer to home because I will have more time for her so please can you let that happen as soon as possible please Jesus Amen’ That prayer is the plan of the finite mind, geared to a finite existance and only seeing the immediate future, that prayer does not seek God’s will. So how do we pray to make a prayer of petition? ‘Jesus I love you and trust in You. You know my situation and the job at the factory, I put this in Your hands and entrust it to your loving care and offer You all of my life for Your will. Amen’ That prayer is a loving prayer, a prayer that loves Jesus and trusts in Him and invites God’s will into their lives. This is a prayer of petiton and will bring many graces.

This is why we make prayers of petition because we love those we pray for and we love the One we pray to and we unite both in our prayers and we always ask for God’s will.

Make your prayers of petition. You may think nothing is happening but it is when nothign seems to be happening that a great deal of ‘undercover work’ is happening in the hearts and souls of men by God’s grace. Most of God’s work is hidden and what is only seen is the end result.

The people in your life are there by God’s Providence and you have a duty to pray for them and them for you, we each in our own time must pray for each other and for all those who have died and all those yet to be born. It is only in heaven that we will understand the unity of peoples in Christ, that is the Communion of Saints, and how important it is that we minister to each other not only in works but also by prayer.

Be patient and continue to make your very meritous prayers of petition always trusting in God when you invite Him into your life and into the lives of others, this is when God’s plan blossoms for people.

Would you please remember to say a little prayer for all those people who have no-one to pray for them?

You might like to read St Teresa of Avila’s writings on prayer.

Pray to the Holy Spirit

In my prayers

 

[momof8]

Hi Greg W

I have thought a lot about this myself. As far as Fatima, I think Mary meant not that souls have gone to hell and now we have to try to get them out. She meant that many souls have gone because no one was praying for them, and more will go if we refuse to increase our prayers for those on earth with us. God has chosen in his wisdom to require our assistance for our fellow men. If he has given us grace, he expects us to use it - of whom much is given, much will be required. So we have to pray and sacrifice for other sinners.

I suppose we see this in the natural world. Why do we have firefighers and rescue teams if God could very easily rescue people himself? Is God wrong to leave responsibility in our hands? Even though if we fail to act, others will be hurt? So it maybe is not such a surprise that he requires our assistance in other ways, in spiritual ways. He could do it all himself, but it is his will that we participate.

Those are just a couple of quick thoughts on something I also struggle with.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Remember too that no prayer is ‘too late’. God, in that He exists ‘out of time’ (for “Time” itself is a creation, and how then could God be bound by a creation?), can ‘apply’ prayers ‘in time’.

Suppose a man dies today. He is certainly judged at the moment of his death–but does this moment exist for God as “9:30 a.m. on A.D. February 26, 2007?” Does your prayer for him, should he be in a state of sin (no one can know for sure whether mortal or venial), given at 9:35 a.m. then come ‘too late’ to help him? I do not think so. Rather, provided the person himself does not choose at death finally and irrevocably to deny God, that prayer will have effect for him even though it is after death. If the person has chosen to deny God, that prayer for him will be applied instead as God sees fit. It isn’t wasted. Your prayer was indeed answered, but the answer was perhaps not the one you would have wished for. God will apply that prayer of good intention not to the lost soul who has rejected it but back to you, to the family of that soul, and to other poor souls. The measure you give out will be then the measure returned to you. Good deeds will always reap an abundant harvest. God bless.

 

[FCEGM]

I’ve had some recent troubles with comprehending our need to pray for others. Though I know this may sound cold, it’s the mystery of prayer’s power that’s crippling me. . .

A favorite book of mine, God the Father, by Abbe Emile Guerry, has this to say about petitionary prayer:

My Father knows what I need before I ask Him.
It would be absurd to pretend that I could bring influence to bear upon God. He is the Immutable. He does not change. My prayer can put no pressure on Him to make Him will or cease to will. But since He is free to dispose of His gifts He freely ordained that some should be had in response to prayer; so that we might be obliged to realise our poverty, to have recourse to Him, to seek refuge in Him. He has already seen everything before we ask Him. The whole course of events lies spread before His eternal eye, and proceeds according to the designs of His Love. He sees events and all their causes. Among their moral causes He sees also this present prayer of ours. Our own poor prayer, offered up from this lost corner of the universe, at this fleeting moment in time, was taken into consideration from all eternity by this omnipotent God Who holds all things in His hands . . . .He heard it, where He dwells beyond time and change, where there is no before or after. . . .He saw our intention and He saw our need in the eternal simplicity of His creative Thought. He welcomed our prayer before it was uttered. And, since He is Father, He had already heard it for the greater good of our soul: “who is there among you of whom, if his son shall ask bread, will he reach him a stone?. . .If you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?”
O Father . . . how great an act is prayer! It sets us already in our place in eternity, while we are still borne along on the current of time. It brings us back to the true source of our life, and associates us with this universal government by which Thou makest all things serve the true good of Thy sons.

 

[gus3]

Hi Greg W,

You said, “Respectfully, in the end–it’s always God’s will no matter what.”

“God’s will” contains, in part, two cooperative aspects: permission and approval. In Luke 13:4-5, Jesus pointed out that these two are not always simultaneous: “Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”

Sometimes things “just happen” to us. It saddens Him to see His creation injured, as a parent is saddened to see his 4-year-old fall off a bike the first time the training wheels come off. What God wants, what a parent wants (joy, strength, confidence), and what actually happens, do not always coincide in the short term. In the end, though, the greater good comes out of it. We, as the children, do not always understand how. In faith, this need to know is reduced to a curiosity which will be satisfied in good time.

I hope this helps you in your consideration of prayer.

In the Lord’s faith,
gus3