There lived a middle aged professor, who somehow believed that money and status do not make everything. The professor yearned to visit a monk who lived in the outskirts of the city, whom people occasionally visited. The first time he went there, he was told that the monk is on prayer. Again he came there another day; that time also he was told that Guruji is on prayer. However, he did not ask the attending Sannyasi, if he can talk to him. This repeated several times and one day he asked the attending sanyasi, if the monk or anyone in the Ashram will ever be out of prayer room. The sanyasi told him that every moment every one there will be on prayer. He further said that everything they do there is prayer and Guruji is doing the cow shed cleaning prayer now. This was the first time that he heard somebody saying that prayer is not chanting.
This story came to my mind as I happened to join an online debate on prayer, where distinct views were shared. However, it was generally agreed that prayer is not what we generally mean and most of our digital prayers reflect only selfishness of some sort and some of them are dangerously harmful too. Ignoring the fact that everyone here is partaking in a universal programme, we strive to implement individual projects. Ours is precisely a mad race for selfish wants. We build our own castles believing that God can be tricked through prayers and offerings. Doesn't a prayer for first rank imply a request not to entitle others for this prestigious honour? There are still some other prayers in which the deity is assured a sum provided it does the service the way it is intended by the applicant.
The debate concluded saying that prayers clearly work, provided they are for somebody or something else; prayers work if they are an outpouring of gratitude from within, prayers work if they are for the grace to see today only what God wants one to see today; to desire today only what God wants one to desire today; to think today only what God wants one to think today; to listen today only what God wants one to listen today; to speak today only what God wants one to speak today; to do today only what God wants one to do today (thank you Dr James Kottoor for the tip). There, everything is absolutely divine, perfectly harmonized.
Joseph Mattappally
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