How do we use prayer?
On Sunday 13 September 2015, the Meeting for Learning will be an exploration of how we each use prayer. There is a wide variation in how people use prayer, and their beliefs around prayer. There is most likely a significant variation in how Friends and Attenders in Canterbury Quaker Meeting use prayer, how they think about it, the extent to which they believe it is effective, and even about how it works.
The Reverend Giles Fraser delivered a Thought for the Day regarding prayer on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday 25 August 2015. Both the text of his piece, and the audio recording, can be found here: Thought for the Day.
Below is a simple questionnaire which asks a number of questions about how you think about prayer. If you intend to attend the Meeting for Learning, it would be helpful were you to print off a copy of the questionnaire (you will find a printer-friendly PDF file at the bottom of this web page), augment it with written responses, and bring the document with you to the Meeting for Learning. Otherwise you are most welcome simply to think about your responses to the questions.
Questionnaire: Prayer
The questions below invite you to reflect on your thoughts about, and practice regarding, your use of prayer. It may be that you pray in different ways, and perhaps for different reasons, depending on circumstance. If so, please treat each circumstance separately. In this way you will be able to achieve a richer picture of your engagement with prayer.
What distinctions, if any, do you make between prayer, meditation and contemplation? If you make little distinction between these activities, which term do you prefer to use for what it is that you do: prayer, meditation or contemplation? (In the rest of this list of questions, the terms ‘pray’ and ‘prayer’ will be used. Answer the questions in whatever ways are most helpful for you.)
List the circumstances under which you pray:
a) physical environment,
b) occasions.
Try to be exhaustive. For each of these circumstances, suggest how frequently you pray.
When you pray, do you use words?
If you use words, are the words yours, or those of someone else, such as a benediction or words from a prayer book?
If the words are your own, are they spontaneous, or do your words follow a set formula?
If you use words in your prayer, do you pray out loud, or silently?
If you pray out loud, do you pray in unison with other people?
Do you pray in chant?
Rank in order of preference with whom you prefer to pray:
with another person (your parent, your partner, a minister)
with other people who you know (such as a group of friends, a house-group, a small and familiar church congregation)
in crowds (such as a large church congregation, a public gathering)
In order to enter a prayerful state of mind, which of the following do you perform:
Read a passage of scriptural or religious writing
Focus your attention on a devotional object
Focus your attention on a devotional word or phrase
Focus your attention on a calming word or phrase
Focus your attention on your breathing
Allow all thoughts to float away
If your prayer is directed towards someone or something, to what or whom do you pray?
For which of the purposes listed below do you typically pray?
To praise, worship and adore (this might be highly religious, but might equally, say, concern the wonder of nature, the wonder of existence, or love for another person)
To request something for yourself (e.g. money, preferment, success, better health)
To request something for another person (e.g. success, better health)
To petition for a miracle
To discern the divine will (so as to give guidance in a specific situation)
To align yourself with the divine will (acceptance / obedience)
To align your self (selves) more robustly with virtue
To access your sense of spirituality
To create an inner sense of calm
To reach a place of inner equanimity and detachment
List any other purposes regarding why you pray.
How successful / effective does your act of praying tend to be?
How do you measure the effectiveness of your praying?
Are there times and / or occasions when your praying appears to have been more / less effective?
Explain the mechanisms by which, you believe, your praying is effective.