Prayer
I just began reading Walk In Love: Episcopal Beliefs and Practices by Scott Gunn and Melody Wilson Shobe. So far, it seems a gentle, orderly approach to helping others known Christ and live out their lives in Him via the Episcopal faith. A few days ago, I read the chapter on prayer. Part of my dissonance with my Catholic upbringing revolves around the formulaic prayers that I grew up with. It felt like too much emptiness to recite big words over and over until I knew them so well that I could say each prayer without engaging my mind or heart within it. Is this prayer? And is the answer to this disconnection the types of freeform prayers characteristic of low church tradition? These prayers may engage our minds more immediately but can also become empty pockets of flowery jargon without meaning. Such prayers can also center around our own perceptions and needs to the point where the prayer becomes more about the individual than God. One thing I like about the book is that they conn