Stop praying to feel God's presence

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Stop praying was a suggestion by our priest during Easter Sunday’s sermon.

He was talking about a parishioner that was frustrated with her prayer life, exasperated by not feeling God’s presence. His advice to her, based on an exercise mentioned to him, was to stop praying completely and simply observe with your senses and try to feel God’s presence in the room. Apparently this exercise was quite successful and eventually helped turn around her prayer life.

I thought it was a bit unusual to mention this on Easter Sunday. But I’m curious if anyone has done the same, or is this based on some origin or spiritual teaching?
 
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Psalms 46:11 “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Trying a new technique in your prayer life when you feel like you’ve hit a wall is also a logical step to take.

There is a school of thought about levels of prayer, that saying words of prayer is the lower level, mental prayer is a step up, and sitting and feeling the presence of God is above that. I am not sure if I buy this “hierarchy” concept, but it is good to do some of each.

I don’t see anything wrong with mentioning this on Easter Sunday or any other time; where I part ways would be if the priest was telling everybody that this was the only way of having a prayer life. It does not sound like that’s what he was saying. He was specifically addressing a case of someone who was frustrated with their prayer life. This sort of thing is probably where a spiritual director is helpful to some people to coach them a little when they get frustrated and feel like they have hit a roadblock with God.
 
Sounds like he was encouraging folks to be good listeners. Great advice for all areas of life, including prayer!
 
I’m not sure if I’m understanding correctly, but we cannot willfully seek to “feel” God with our senses. I smoke pipes, and part of the fun of it is buying new blends and carefully trying to pick out the subtle flavors each different kind of tobacco or processing technique produces. I don’t know that feeling God is akin to this, the result of careful attention and concentration of the physical senses.

As Bearself mentioned their is a hierarchy of prayer within spiritual theology and you can read about it in the work of the Carmelites especially (St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross). The general idea is that all people are capable of a deep prayer life, but that after a certain “stage of development” (which involves physical and spiritual purgation, growth in virtue, as well as a committed prayer life) there are states God grants us as pure gifts, and no amount of action on our part will produce them. Feeling God’s presence is a wonderful experience and a great grace, however it is not the goal of prayer. We can do our best to dispose ourselves to receive that grace, however the times I’ve honestly “felt” God have often been unexpected and irrespective of location or personal intention. I’ve also gone through extended stretches where God feels about as far away as possible, almost as if I’ve been totally abandoned. But, this is a reality of the interior life, and to some degree I gather it’s the norm.

I’d be curious to know the details of this advice, as well as your priest’s own spiritual formation.
 
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RKS89 said:
Feeling God’s presence is a wonderful experience and a great grace, however it is not the goal of prayer.
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I agree with this, but the reality is that people sometimes experience an extreme amount of frustration when they feel God is “not present” or is somehow “not listening to them”. We see people posting on this forum and also in the Prayer Intentions all the time, desperate to somehow feel the presence of God, or know that He is there and not ignoring them, and it’s a very real desperation and hurt.

The hurt is worse if the person has had a personal tragedy, illness, serious difficulty etc. and feels like they just cannot get in touch with God. We don’t know what this lady might have been going through.

In my judgment, it would be a totally wrong move for a priest to respond to someone who is having trouble “feeling the presence of God” by just telling them, “well, feeling God is not the goal of prayer so you shouldn’t even be fussing about this.” A better way is to suggest different ways they might get a sense of God “being there” for them. Often it’s not about getting nice “feels” but rather, knowing that God has not abandoned you in a difficult moment. I don’t see any need to question the priest’s formation - he was helping his parishioner as I would expect a priest to do.

It is true that we are not going to automatically “feel” God by using some kind of different prayer technique, and this should not be our general goal in praying, but when God does allow you to have some feeling of his presence, especially at a terrible moment in our lives like when someone has died or when you are having serious health or financial difficulties, it is a great gift that God gives us.
 
I agree with everything you said. It’s also frustrating to have frequently felt God early in your spiritual life and then to not feel Him later on. Even with the study of spiritual theology, all the writings of the Mystics and saints, prayer and the interior can still be extremely subjective. Obviously there are blanket statements and core ideas all Catholics can adhere to, but our daily practices and experiences are vast and varying. Which is why spiritual direction is so important. All I can offer someone struggling with prayer is what I’ve studied, what I’ve experienced, and what has and has not worked for me. And what works for me in 5, 10 or 20 years may be completely different than what works today.

In a lot of ways it’s like exercise. With exercise you first need a goal (lose weight, gain muscle, speed up your mile time etc). Then you need to identify the most efficient plan to get to that goal- the diet and exercise routine of an Olympic figure skater is different from that of a professional bodybuilder is different from a marathon runner. Each of those goals and specific athletic endeavors have generally accepted wisdom attached. If you want to lose weight you need to eat less calories. If you want to gain muscle you need to lift heavy weight and eat more. Those are general statements we use as a rule of thumb. But here’s the thing, some people hate running (I do). So if their goal is weight loss a personal trainer might have them alternate sprinting with walking. Some people’s physiology prohibits them from certain weightlifting exercises. A trainer knows many variations of standard exercises to try out with clients to find the one that fits their unique anatomy and goals. And even with a good program and solid diet our progress can cease altogether, and then it’s back to the drawing board. And all of these goals and practices come with their own unique set of challenges and setbacks. A good spiritual director is like a trainer, who helps us both get started and when we stall (or perceive that we have stalled).

To be clear, I was only curious what spiritual tradition he received his formation from, not questioning it’s validity or merit. I could have told you Pope Francis was a Jesuit by reading transcripts of his homilies, but I don’t know that I could pick out someone trained by Dominicans, for example. I just like to know where people are coming from is all.
 
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I totally agree with the “exercise” concept. I think of my prayer life similarly to working out at a gym.
You need to do different types of exercises, although you might be wanting to concentrate in a certain area for a while and then branch out to something else, or you might be seeking a specific goal (bulking up your muscles, or improving your cardio) that causes you to pick certain exercises.

Right now for example I am concentrating on certain types of “word” prayer devotions, so telling me to be silent and just sit with the Lord is not where my head is at. I do it a little bit from time to time, but I don’t want to spend an hour a day on that and I don’t feel it is helpful right now.
It may be very helpful down the road or when I get in a different situation/ pursuing a different goal.

My impression is that a lot of people may not stop to consider the rich variety of ways to pray, so when they “discover” something like being silent in God’s presence, or incorporating more Scripture into their prayer, it’s like a big revelation to them. But I guess we are all guilty of tunnel vision at times.
 
I know when I learned Ignatian prayer methods I couldn’t shut up about it. I felt like I’d been handed a key to my own spiritual life. But some people just don’t click with the practice. It is a mystery!
 
Some years ago, when I was going through a brief but intense period of anxiety and fear, I stopped into Adoration and sat there completely broken in mind and spirit and body. I could not pray verbally or mentally at all; my mind was racing and confused; I felt totally exhausted in body so that I couldn’t even kneel; I was in near despair. I just sat, like a bump on the log, and looked at the Eucharist.
Although it did not feel it at the time, I look back now and realize that this was not only the moment I began to heal but the best and most sincere prayer I’ve ever made in my life.
That instance taught me volumes about prayer.
 
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I had that happen recently too, due to an unexpected family tragedy.

I went into a panic attack that kept up for about 2 weeks.

It lifted when I was looking at the Eucharist during the Holy Thursday Altar of Repose adoration time, right after I also asked Our Lady of Guadalupe for help. It hasn’t been back.

God is good and the grace of the Eucharist at Adoration is amazing.
 
Sounds like early contemplative Prayer. Just listen to God.
 
He was, in fact, telling her to actually pray.

“For prayer is nothing else than being on terms of friendship with God.” - Saint Teresa of Avila

And when the scriptures say “Pray without ceasing”, do you think it means something always formal and verbal?
 
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Thanks for sharing, I had a similar experience during Adoration. Unfortunately with my schedule now, I can’t make it during the time it’s offered.
RKS89 said:
know when I learned Ignatian prayer methods I couldn’t shut up about it. I felt like I’d been handed a key to my own spiritual life. But some people just don’t click with the practice. It is a mystery!
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Thanks for mentioning this, and to all who responded (I always appreciate the comments from the bear lady.) I’m going to look into the Ignatian prayer methods.

I’ve hit a bit of a rut in my prayer life to be honest, I can’t really put my finger on it. I had recently finished a 54 day rosary novena, and I felt like my life has been wrung through the wringer during that time. Now I have this kind of a dark cloud of reluctance to dedicate such time to prayer. Lately I’ve been only peppering my day with short prayers of thanksgiving. I was curious about this method the priest mentioned as I can relate to being frustrated.
 
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I had a similar experience making my Marian Consecration. I’ve never experienced so much trial, except maybe for the time leading up to the Easter Vigil and having my marriage convalidated.
 
Roseeurekacross said:
Sounds like early contemplative Prayer. Just listen to God.
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The contemplative prayer is not a listen of God, but the joy of taste God. The fruits of the contemplative prayer, are the disgust of the goods of the world, and the desire to suffer in order to be detached from the world (that we hate) and to be more united to God or to die to see him face to face
 
Tis_Bearself said:
It lifted when I was looking at the Eucharist during the Holy Thursday Altar of Repose adoration time, right after I also asked Our Lady of Guadalupe for help. It hasn’t been back.

God is good and the grace of the Eucharist at Adoration is amazing.
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You guys are making my heart swell with joy!!! ❤️
 
In my experience I can do a lot of things to distract myself. That could even include praying. Distracting takes you away from observing. So it makes sense to me that even prayer could keep you from feeling God’s presence.

I think of the story of Mary and Martha. Martha was busy doing things while Mary sat at the feet of Jesus and listened. Even prayer could be doing things when it would be better to listen.
 
I would disagree , monastic contemplative prayer is stillness, silence, listening to God.
And no, it’s not centering Prayer.
It’s also not meditative Prayer.
 
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I advise you to read the theological sum of St. Thomas Aquinas, IIa-IIae question 180. Or read St Albert Legrand on this link in French contemplation (you can use google translation).
Contemplation consists in “seeing” with joy and admiration God or one of his attributes. And when we have tasted God once, we consider all the goods of this world as mud, we want to be separated from them. Contemplation of God is the finality of the spiritual life on this earth, and even in the eternity
 
Well thanks,
And see the catechism for contemplative, vocal and meditative Prayer I posted below. It’s quite a beautiful read.
And again, the way of contemplative prayer is stillness, silence, listening to God.
This is the doing, the active, the how we get there. in this type Prayer we consider nothing. We are trying to foster and nurture a time of not being distracted. To listen to God.

We push away all positive and negative thoughts. We leave them till later.

Yes , you are talking of fruits and results and of the ultimate reason for this prayer. I am talking of the doing.

There are three ways of prayer, types of prayer if you like. They all bear different fruits and have their purpose
Vocal, meditative and contemplative.
 
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