What prayer can (and can't) do

[aeditimi]

In an earlier post, I wrote about praying for a woman whose family wants her to get better while she herself wants to be at peace:

And here I sit with a theology that says I can’t really request that God make anything happen.

A commenter on my WordPress Blog asked if I could say more about that, or if I’ve written about it in the past. I’m sure I

Comments

[ext_100315]

What I really love about you and your theology is that it's so post-modern, so about the "in and of" of humans and brokenness and the joy that happens anyway.

The catch that frustrates me to no end whenever I try to think about it though, is my own inability to see the point. What's the *use* of a God who rejoices and suffers and anguishes over things just as we do? What's the value of looking for something more than human, more with it, more open-minded, more loving than humans, but whom is just as ineffectual as we are? The wonderings alway start out all interestingly metaphysical but wind up making me feel like the whole thing is just a waste of my time. And then further ponderings take me out of the picture altogether, and I can't see that there's any God or any Spiritual presence or power at all. Maybe once there was, I'm happy to grant that, but I can't see anything but spiritual ambivalence in the universe.

I suppose I'll stick with Voltaire, and move to the utterly immoral den of iniquity that is New York. :o)

Separately, it must be smoke alarm battery replacement time. I replaced the battery in one yesterday morning, came home last night to another one beeping and replaced it, and took care of the third when it woke me up at 3am. Grr.