IN PRAYER WE TALK TO GOD. IN MEDITATION AND CONTEMPLATION, THAT CAN WEAVE DREAMS WITHIN PRAYER, WE SEEK AND FIND AND LISTEN TO GOD. THERE IS A DEEP-SET SPIRITUAL THERAPY TO BE FOUND WITHIN PRAYER. WE CANNOT FORM THE WORDS THAT COME FROM DEEP IN OUR HEARTS, AND FROM DEEP IN OUR SOULS, WITHOUT AWAKENING SOME DEEP MYSTICAL PART OF OURSELVES. SUCH IS THE SPIRITUAL MEANING OF BOTHER PRAYER AND MEDITATION, SUCH IS THE LIGHT WE CAST UPON OUR SACRED AND MYSTICAL PATH TO GOD AND THE ONE.
A pilgrim stands upon the very edge of our Mother Earth. Mother Earth, our precious Gaia is in shadow. So too is our pilgrim. Yet beyond our pilgrim there is a sky gloriously bright with starlight. And there is also a pair of hands clasped in prayer. This is a sacred moment in the spiritual unfoldment of ourselves and our planet. Both are linked. Both are entangled. We seek the sacred, but can only make manifest the sacred in ourselves and each other when we also bring sacredness back into the environment of our planet which we have done so much to despoil. Humanity is at the turning point in our agelong spiritual quest back to ONENESS with the ALL. Our time of the Great Spiritual Awakening has come.
Whenever we pray, we are in a real sense talking to God. When we meditate, we might say that we are in essence listening to God. In reality, of course, the situation is far from being such a binary one. In praying – in talking – we are undoubtedly engaged, undoubtedly aware. Even at its most basic level we can claim that we are deep in a sort of spiritual therapy, talking to a silent listener whom we know / believe understands us and cares for us. In that light, prayer is undoubtedly therapeutic. In that light, within the silence of the ‘unknown’ listener we can find answers. Whether they be answers from deep within ourselves, or answers from deep within the Silence of God, hardly matters. In meditation – in listening – we are also undoubtedly engaged, undoubtedly aware. Now, though, the silent listener is ourselves, and within our silence we can reach equally deep and equally therapeutic understanding. Do we touch the infinite universe beyond ourselves? Or is the infinite universe forever within us? It hardly matters.
There is a deep-set spiritual therapy to be found within prayer. We cannot form the words that come from deep in our hearts, and from deep in our souls, without awakening some deep mystical part of ourselves. The silent listeners, as we pray, are there: listening, heeding, pondering what might be done against what destiny within this life we have embarked upon and should not be dissuaded from. So too is the silent listener that is the deep and sacredly mystical part of ourselves. Our prayers can touch the eternal infinity of the universe. And the eternal infinity of the universe is both ‘out there’ and ‘in here’. We do not actually pray to ourselves, but the forming of the words, when felt in our hearts, seep deep into our souls. So often they may be questions without answers, but so often the questions, having been articulated, are in fact the answers.
There is not a moment in our lives that is not sacred and spiritually connected with the deepest and highest parts of ourselves and indeed with the ALL. So often we lead our lives as if blind. Yet what we cannot see, both ‘out there’ and ‘in here’ is mystically illumined for us here and now and for all time. There is not a thought, not a word spoken, not a gesture offered, that is not a prayer, that is not ‘spoken’ from the very depths of our souls. If we could see our true selves, mystically illumined in all our breath-taking radiance, we would know that our very lives are prayers, and our very selves in how we think and feel, and how we act, are the sacred answers to our prayers.
Even as we walk the sacred groves of our Mother Earth, our love and appreciation for the life and beauty and nurturing of our Holy Gaia is a prayer of thanksgiving that we trail behind us, and that trail of love and appreciation is food for the very soul of Mother Earth. So is that the case with every moment of our lives, with everyone with whom we have contact. And even the distant infinite eternity of the stars is touched and made the more radiant by the thanksgiving in our hearts.
The entirety of our life is a prayer.