by Peter Mullen, TCW
IT’S THE Sunday before Ash Wednesday, so I thought I would offer you something about prayer. But what do I know about prayer? At a pinch, I could write an intro to the philosophy of David Hume or how I hated it when Surrey finished above Yorkshire seven times in the County Championship in the 1950s. But my own prayers are embarrassing and go something like this . . .
‘God, I’m no good at this. I’m just self-centred, praying for myself. I’m a hypocrite and my flesh creeps when I think of the things I’ve ill-done and done to others’ harm which at the same time I took for the exercise of virtue. I’m a complete fraud and a ****. Sorry to use such bad language. I’m scared. I’m full of doubt — even about your existence. I can’t even sincerely pray to be made good, because I’m too fond of the selfish desires that please me. As you can probably see, I’m a right mess. I even feel awkward saying prayers anyway. It’s just not me. Yet here I am a priest and I’m supposed to be able to teach people. Oh God, I can’t do this!’
They say that those who can do and those who can’t teach. Yet I keep coming back for more as it says in Proverbs 26:11. (Look it up if you’re interested. I’m a nice person and too squeamish to quote the Bible where it’s not nice). Well, then, have I anything to show for a lifetime’s — admittedly half-hearted — effort? Only this:
You can ask God for things. But the truth is that God will only give you what he’s got to give. If you’re like a happy-clappy I once knew in York, you can pray for a parking space. But God doesn’t deal in parking spaces. Prayer is not a shopping list and it’s not psychotherapy, as the nauseating versions of religion we get on TV and the self-help magazines present it. Don’t even look at their blasphemous presentation of religion as spirituality or something that works for YOU! Plug your ears when you come across jargon such as the need to make your very own personal journey and, even worse, to discover your own personality or to answer your deep personal needs.