Keeping Him Company: A Lenten Quarantine Reflection

A common thread of struggle these past few weeks has been the struggle of personal prayer. As the tally marks of days without Mass grow greater and greater, the days without conversation with Our Lord seem to increase as well. Whenever this frustration is expressed, I’ve heard it met with a chorus of, “SAME, girl.” And trust me, I’m singing in the choir.

The motivation seems dead and the satisfaction in prayer seems deader.

But perhaps this is a lesson.

Too frequently I view prayer in all the wrong ways. Upon greater self-recollection, I tend to view prayer wrongly in three different perspectives.

1) I view prayer as something that should “feel good” and be refreshing and rejuvenating to my soul. And when my prayer is not, I chalk it up as “bad prayer.” While emotions in prayer are a gift and a blessing from the Lord, they are not a requirement to make prayer legit. Fr. Jacques Philippe has a book called “Time for God,” which completely revolutionized my attitude toward prayer. In this book, Fr. Philippe touches on this idea of prayer when he says:

“What matters is not whether our mental prayer is beautiful, or whether it works, or whether it is enriched by deep thoughts and feelings, but whether it is persevering and faithful. Our first concern, if I may put it that way, should be faithfulness in praying, not the quality of our prayer.”

Yes, you may put it that way, Father. When approached from this attitude, even the most unsatisfying of prayer can be viewed as a victory, because we prayed in the face of adversity. It is easy to love when feelings run rampant. But love is proven most in the act of a choice, when there are no feelings at all. And what is prayer other than an expression of our love for God?

2) I view prayer as a recipe with specific ingredients, and I am the head chef. Here, again. Fr. Philippe brought my misconceptions about prayer into the light.

“The life of prayer is not the result of a technique, but a gift we receive… talk about prayer should not focus on describing methods or giving instructions, but on explaining the necessary condition for receiving the gift.”

The first time I read this, I felt as though a huge burden had been lifted off my shoulders! I also deleted about half of the prayer apps off my phone. No more was it all about me finding the perfect combination of journaling, spiritual reading, rosary-saying, litany-reciting, bible-reading, and praise-and-worship-listening that I could squeeze into my allotted holy hour once a week. While these good practices remained (and should remain) my attitude toward them completely changed. Rather, my focus shifted toward God. Slowly, our conversation in prayer became less and less one-sided as I stopped talking long enough to let Him get a word in edgewise. I started opening myself up more to Him and how He was wanting to work in my life. I started trusting that He was present, and that He would bring fruitfulness out of my prayer. And yes, some days I missed saying the Litany for the Day. But I gained more than I lost.

And that leads me to my last wrong perspective toward prayer.

3) The view that prayer is all for me. Again, too often I approach prayer only for the strength or consolation I can receive from it. But as far as love goes, that is the most self-centered love imaginable. If I want to say that I love God, I must strive for the noblest love there is. Real love is love that does not seek after its own gain, but love that has as its sole aim the good of the beloved. While we often talk about this love in our human relationships, this love should penetrate our relationship with God as well. As Fr. Philippe says, “we pray not to find fulfillment or self-satisfaction, but to please God.” And while this kind of love is extremely demanding, it is actually rewarding and liberating. When prayer is hard and leaves us unsatisfied, we can find comfort in the fact that we gave our time to God which brings Him joy.

The truth is, He desires our company. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus did not need His Apostles there, but He wanted them there. He wanted to be with them. During this time of quarantine and social distancing, it is easy for us to be frustrated by our inability to be with Him in the Sacraments and in Mass. But have you ever thought He might be missing you as well? With Adoration shut down across the world, we are not the only ones more alone. He wants us to keep Him company. And while we currently cannot do that in the same way we could in a chapel, that does not mean we are incapable of it. Let’s give Him our days. Give Him our online classes. Give Him our work problems. Give Him our loneliness and unite it to His. He desires the sort of relationship where you can just sit with the other and there is no pressure to do or say anything at all. The pleasure of the other’s company is enough. In the face of this battle for personal prayer, let’s approach it from a different perspective. Let’s keep Him company.