Littleport Christian Spiritualists

In most gatherings, and a staple of religious communities and individuals alike, prayers are very much a clear and present feature. But do we actually use them right? Do we actually know what the meaning and purpose is? Throughout history, these most important and vital forms of connection and action (yes, I said action) have been, in some if not many cases, changed in meaning, completely misunderstood, and massively under utilised.

The subject of Prayer comes up a lot in my job, so now that we have this website, I thought it would be a good place to share some thoughts and insights that might be useful!

Firstly, and surprisingly; “what is a prayer” needs to be addressed. Whilst they have many uses and many functions, the first and primary use is twofold, one part of which is given insight and clue within its name to “pray” literally is to “praise”. It is a message and connection to the divine energy, the creator, the “Great Spirit” the “Divine Source” or just simply, “God”.

History & Etymology

The Second is equally obvious in the name with a little digging, the root of words is always a good clue to the meaning of something, the word “prayer” is a derivative of the Latin “precari”, which means “to beg”. But that’s not where it ends. To beg is a very unfortunate term, because it is not something that we spiritualists perceive as something the creator would seek us to do, even though in our darkest hours, that is exactly what we do in fact lean on.

The equivalent word used in the bible, particularly the old testament, originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic, not Latin or English puts something of a different spin in it. Perhaps the concerns of John of Patmos in his visions and writings at the end of the New Testament foresaw this as being part of the problems we would face in religion; not only do people of power put their own spin on things, translation and transliteration are now always the precise science we see them to be, things get lost and mixed up, because the Hebrew meaning of prayer, is the Hebrew equivalent “tefilah”, however, along with its root “pelel” or its reflexive “l’hitpallel”, means the act of self-analysis or self-evaluation.

Something we Spiritual folk know all too well, and is far more an appropriate and in fact desire of the Great Spirit. It wants us to look within, to grow from within, to see if we have a solution within, and a personal discussion with the Great Spirit is a key and much more useful to it than bowing and scraping on bended knee. I knew a friend in my first circle, June Bower, who had been a Spiritualist longer than I had been alive at the beginning of my journey in this way of life, who when it came time to pray, refused to bow her head.

She explained this wasn’t to be disrespectful, quite the opposite. She said; “if you are talking to someone and you want them to hear you, you look at them not look away – if you bow your head, with all the prayers God gets sent, he might not hear you – but if you are the only one looking at him he can read your lips.” At first I thought she was joking, but actually, she wasn’t.

One thing we get told all the time is that we need to raise our vibrations in order to reach out to spirit, true enough, but then in the same breath, (although certainly not part of my development pattern) some will tell us to ground ourselves, root ourselves to the Earth, before doing so. Grounding is important and has its uses, but mostly and primarily in the realms of personal work, within one’s own soul and within one’s own auric or psychic magnetic field, to keep you rooted in that moment.

If you are climbing a mountain the rope you use to stop yourself from falling is attached to the mountain itself as you travel upwards, not the floor at the base where you started. Protection goes with you, if you wish to move forward, it must be mobile, not locked in place. I often fear the concept of grounding is misused to prevent us from being the best we can be, because certainly when connection to the Spirit you really cannot get lost or disconnected from the physical world, that only ever happens once in our physical life, and when it does it is permanent. Getting lost in the moment, (very different) can be prevented by tying the rope to the rock face, not the foot of the mountain. When we send out our thoughts, send out our prayers, we are attempting to be heard by the highest level of existence; not our own feet!

This was a point June was making, if you are forever looking down you will will always be bumping into things, look up and see where you are going, and direct your thoughts to the one that you are addressing. It is, certainly from a human perspective, more polite!

The Structure of Prayer

Prayers are in simple modern terms, an email to the Boss. You start with where it is going, give it a subject heading, get to the point, then sign off.

I have spoken many times, and have even touched on it in this website, in my brief about what Spiritualism is, about the relationship with God being personal. When I get sent a message, or an email, it will be addressed to me in many ways, depending on who sent it; ‘Dear Sir’, ‘Hey Nick’, ‘Attn: Rev Brown’ or simply, ‘Hey Wee Bro’. We call people by the term that is the most comfortable to use and the relationship we have with them. The same is to be said for our relationship with the great Spirit. Call it by the name it knows you are most comfortable with, just like us, we recognise people by how they address us, well so does the Great Spirit.

Just like any other petition for help, earthly or otherwise, it’s also equally polite to acknowledge previous help before asking for more; “hey Nick, thanks for the info you sent me last week on that episode of Babylon 5 you were talking about the other day, was just wondering, do can you direct me to where I can watch the full episode please?”. Sound like a familiar structure? It should be. It’s simple manners really. What if our prayers don’t seem to have been previously answered then?

“Hey Nick, thanks for taking the time to read this email, I know you are busy, I was just wondering, did you have that information about the Babylon 5 episode we discussed?” Honestly the simple premise here; manners cost nothing.

Which brings me to another important part or the structure of prayer, and the email analogy still holds well. Have you received those emails and texts and social media messages that you know are pre-formatted, read the same, because they are the same? Do you read them to the end?

Prayers by rote! Don’t get me wrong, they have their use, and place. But all too often we memorise the words, but not the meaning. Where is the self analysis, where is the clear plea, where is the personal meaning.

How many people really, when they say the Lord’s Prayer, realise they are making a promise to take personal responsibility for making the world a better place, heaven-like, right off the bat, but instead thinking “oh that’s one of the things in your court God! “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” is to acknowledge our own role in the works we perform in the name of Spirit. Interestingly, a good friend and Hebrew speaker once told me; “Yeshua when he gave that prayer was teaching people how to pray, it wasn’t designed to be memorised, it was ‘say something like this’ because it covered all of the bases”, but the important part of a prayer is you should mean it, and as we have discussed, you really can only say what you mean, when you mean what you say; if you are not 100% sure what you are saying, you don’t really know what you are saying and can’t mean it. (I think that makes sense, even I got a little lost there).

The point, a prayer should be personal, “call me by my old familiar name” is not just for friends and relatives, it is for all, and it should be at the very least, addressed and spoken in a way that we would wish to be addressed and spoken to. To chastise people for making a prayer that is personal, is missing the point of the personal relationship we so strongly promote.

When is a Prayer, Why is a Prayer

Ultimately there are many reasons, and many categories that a prayer can fall into, which is why I reference them when setting the tone within the moment of a collective prayer; “send out your thoughts, and prayers, your affirmations and intentions” are all pretty much the same thing but for specific individual uses, it’s like the Swiss army knife of praying, and most prayers have a sniff of each within them. Affirmations are a statement of positive assertion, and intentions are what we want or need. That said, remember when you pray, you’re having a conversation with an old friend, an important one, yes, but a friend nonetheless, not sending a shopping list to amazon.com!

In times of need, for support and self reflection, in moments of gratitude to Spirit for aid given, in quiet moments, where we just seek to be a part of the universe in a more intimate and quieter way, prayers are there to send that message out into the universe, to the Source, the Creator.

Use them wisely, use them well, and remember, if someone tells you it “must be said this way or that way” in some generic form, without any personal meaning, input or understanding, it might just end up in the celestial spam folder; because the most important part of prayer?

Own it, feel it, Mean it.

Have a blessed day my Chucky Eggs.