Prayer

I'm a big fan of George Carlin, Robin Williams, Seinfeld and other comedians because they talk about facts and point out the follies of some of our ways. Take Carlin for example. One of his tirades goes

I've often thought people treat God rather rudely, don't you? Asking trillions and trillions of prayers every day. Asking and pleading and begging for favors. Do this, gimme that, I need a new car, I want a better job. And most of this praying takes place on Sunday God's day off. It's not nice. And it's no way to treat a friend.

But people do pray, and they pray for a lot of different things. And I say, fine. Pray for anything you want. Pray for anything, but what about the Divine Plan? Remember that? Long time ago, God made a Divine Plan. Gave it a lot of thought, decided it was a good plan, put it into practice. And for billions and billions of years, the Divine Plan has been doing just fine. Now, you come along, and pray for something. Well suppose the thing you want isn't in God's Divine Plan? What do you want God to do? Change the plan? Just for you? Doesn't it seem a little arrogant?

And here's something else, another problem you might have: Suppose your prayers aren't answered. What do you say? "Well, it's God's will." "Thy Will Be Done." Fine, but if it's God's will, and God's going to do what God wants to anyway, why bother praying in the first place? Seems like a big waste of time to me! Couldn't you just skip the praying part and go right to God's Will? It's all very confusing.

Prayer is intended to make the person feel God's presence. But we have converted prayer into a quest of self-fulfillment. We constantly pray - not to acknowledge the fact that we living beings do not control anything. We pray to ask for more. We pray to demand more. We bribe God by offering material gifts. We hold God at ransom by fasting or through self-denial of things we like. Why? Because that's what we are taught we need to do to get something. And I think we were taught wrong.

I myself pray. I don't expect the prayers to be answered, but I do it "just to be on the safe side", in case God really is listening. So in case God's listening, I choose not to waste God's time by praying for myself. I pray for those I love. I pray for things that will make their lives better. And going by my past track record, there's almost a 99-1 split - my prayers for others have worked wonders, those for myself have been a shaky-flaky affair. So I continue to pray for others.

And I dont choose a place or time to pray. I make it spontaneous. I have prayed in trains, I have prayed during meals. I think those are the best forms of prayer, the spontaneous ones. Its when you really want to feel a connection, want to make sense of what you see. And I pray when something good happens to me. Just a quick "thank you". I reckon its common courtesy to say atleast that much to a friend who helps you out.

As a signboard outside my church put it:

"Prayer does not change God's will...

It helps us understand God's ways."