INTRODUCTION

Speaking to a group of aspiring writers, author and editor Jeremy Langford once said, “Write the book that you want to read.” Very often as I settle down to pray, I’m preoccupied by a particular mood or situation in my life. I might be filled with joy returning from a family camping trip, or I might be seething with anger about an argument I’ve just had with my best friend. I might have my dying grandmother in mind, or I simply might want to relax in the stillness of the evening. Often I have a strong sense that God is calling me to bring this mood or situation to our quiet time together. But often, I feel the need for a customized “prayer starter”: a Bible passage that deals with my current mood, a short reflection I can use to begin my conversation with God, a concrete suggestion about how to pray in this particular situation or a pithy quote I can easily memorize and carry with me as I exit my prayer and enter my day. Sitting in my prayer chair with coffee mug in hand, I’ve found myself thinking, “I wish I had a book in which I could look up the mood I’m in today to get me started on my prayer.” Searching long and hard for such a book and not finding one, I decided that I ought to take Langford’s advice and write one myself. God, I Have Issues is not intended to be read from cover to cover. It is a reference manual to help you bring the stuff of your life into your daily prayer time. The concept is simple: using the various indexes in the back of the book, find the entry that best fits your situation or mood. You can read the entire entry in the first few minutes of your prayer time and plan your prayer accordingly, meditating on one of the suggested Scriptures, pondering the reflection or trying out one of the prayer pointers. In the days that follow, you can use the “Suggested Scripture Passages” section to continue your reflections. If you’re still needing more, or if this entry does not quite fit your particular situation, you can check out the suggestions from the “Related Entries” section. Finally, you can memorize or scribble down a quote from the “Words to Take with You” section so that you can return to prayer at quiet moments in your day. Some of the quotes are profound and thought provoking, some are just downright silly. But I hope you will find them to be a helpful way of bringing you back to the reflective state of your earlier prayer time.

One caution about this book: these entries are intended for psychologically healthy people going through the typical cycle of everyday emotions and situations. It is far beyond the scope of this book to deal with serious emotional or psychological problems. “God, I’m Sad,” for example, is written for the psychologically healthy person who happens to be sad today. A person who is clinically depressed will need to seek professional help and should not rely solely on this or any other spiritual or psychological book for recovery from this serious problem. The same holds for all of the other emotions mentioned in the book.

ABOUT PRAYING WITH THIS BOOK

If you are new to meditation and contemplation, I recommend you take the following three steps:

1. Find two or three good books that are introductions to this type of prayer. I recommend one of these:

Green, Thomas. Opening to God. (Ave Maria Press, 1977.)

Hauser, Richard. In His Spirit. (Paulist Press, 1982.)

Keating, Thomas. Intimacy with God. (Crossroad/Herder & Herder, 1996.)

Link, Mark. The Challenge 2000 Series. (Thomas More Press, 1993.)

Thibodeaux, Mark. Armchair Mystic: Easing Into Contemplative Prayer. (St. Anthony Messenger Press, 2001.)

Zanzig, Thomas. Learning to Meditate. (St. Mary’s Press, 1990.)

1. Find a spiritual director, someone who has more experience in contemplation and mediation, who can guide you as you take your first steps and can help you maintain a healthy prayer life once you’ve been at it for a while.
2. Find at least one or two peers with whom you can share your spiritual journeys, exchange insights, ideas and so on.

Here’s a simple formula for using this book in a daily regimen of prayer:

Find a quiet time and space in which to pray every day. Many pray-ers find the best time to pray to be the early morning and the best place to pray to be a chair that is comfortable but not so much so that one would fall asleep easily. Beside your chair, place whatever helps you to pray: a Bible, a candle, a journal and pen, a spiritual book.

Before beginning prayer, ask yourself what topic, emotion, issues or situation God and you might want to work with today. On some days nothing in particular will come to mind. You may want to pray over the liturgical readings of the day or simply have a cup of coffee with Jesus. On other days some particular mood, situation or issue might be very present to you. If so, look up the mood or situation in the book and quickly read over the entire entry. Place the book open-faced beside your chair.

Begin to quiet yourself. Slow down your breathing. Settle down your thoughts. You might want to hum a simple religious tune or speak a mantra, a holy word or phrase, over and over again. For example, you might want to say the name “Jesus” very slowly over and over again. Allow yourself to sit in this holy stillness for as long as it feels comfortable.

If you feel yourself coming out of that stillness and if it feels right to do so, pick up this book and again skim the entire entry. When you find something that strikes you, ignore all the rest and focus on that one part. For example, if a particular Scripture passage looks appealing, look up that passage and pray over it for the entire prayer period. Or perhaps something in the reflection will strike you; then stay with that thought or insight and have a conversation with God about it. Or perhaps you’ll want to try out one of the “Prayer Pointers.”

Whatever you choose to pray with, it is important that you do not clutter your prayer time with activities or even multiple Scripture passages. It is far better to focus on one small point, insight or passage than to jump from one spot to another.

Close your prayer time with the Lord’s Prayer, the Glory Be to the Father or some other ready-made prayer. Before leaving your prayer spot, you might want to consider what you’ll pray over tomorrow. You might also memorize one of the quotes from “Words to Take with You” or scribble it on a slip of paper so that you can go back to it here and there during your day.

ABOUT PRAYING WITH SCRIPTURE

Those who practice Christian meditation and contemplation find praying with Scriptures to be the bread and butter of their prayer life. Therefore, each entry provides a list of “Suggested Scripture Passages.” In preparing to pray, you might want to peruse the list and look up the passages that seem promising. Settle down with one passage and bookmark that spot in your Bible before beginning to pray. That way you won’t have to distract yourself with finding the right passage and flipping to it during the prayer time itself.

Saint Ignatius Loyola suggests that once you have found a passage that really works in prayer (that is, one that helps you get in touch with God), then you should stay with that passage for as long as it continues to work. If the passage really speaks to you or moves you closer to God, you might pray over the same passage again and again for several days or even weeks. The goal then is not to pray over every single passage relating to your mood or situation, but instead to pray deeply over one or, at most, a few passages.

In the same way that you shouldn’t try to cover every passage, you might find it more helpful to focus on one small part of one passage. Psalm 139:1-18, for example, is a rich passage filled with many wonderful words, phrases and images. Instead of trying to cover them all in your prayer time, it would be better to choose the one word, phrase or image that speaks to you today and zero in on that one, leaving all the rest of it behind.

Here are three concrete ways to meditate on Scripture:

Ask a reflection question. Read the passage and think of a reflection question to discuss with God. Basically, ask God and yourself, “What is this passage about?” and, “How does this relate to my life?”

Play a role in the story. Read the Bible story several times and, in your imagination, play the role of one of the characters in the story. Then have a talk with Jesus about what you experienced.

Use a mantra. The mantra is a word, phrase or sentence that you repeat over and over. Simply pick your favorite line from the passage and very slowly, very prayerfully, say that word, phrase or sentence over and over again. Let it take root in your heart.

ABOUT PRAYING WITH EMOTIONS

Why should I pray over my emotions? For the most part, emotions are amoral. That is to say, at least to the extent that I don’t choose the particular emotion I’m now experiencing, they are neither virtuous nor sinful. Very often, good people make the mistake of trying (either unconsciously or consciously) to repress emotions they consider “bad” or “sinful.” For example, if I were married, I may unconsciously hold to this fallacy: “I must suppress all feelings of anger toward my wife because good husbands feel love and affection for their spouses all the time.” The problem is that repressing or suppressing my emotions does not make them go away. On the contrary, strong emotions that are not dealt with straightforwardly will seek some sort of unconscious release. For example, unrepressed anger toward my spouse might lead me to passive-aggressive behavior such as “forgetting” to take care of responsibilities around the house or, even worse, making “harmless jokes” about her to my friends.

So if emotions must be dealt with, then how should I do so? Should I simply scream at the wife anytime I feel angry? Of course not. I can consciously choose for myself how I will release these emotions, but doing so requires reflection and temperance. This is where prayer comes in. If I pray about the strong emotions I’m feeling, God and I can find healthy ways of expressing and releasing them. Oftentimes, simply consciously acknowledging them before God is enough of a release and nothing more is required. At other times I might need to take some concrete action. At those times I will have to discern what is the right action-what is God’s will for me. Returning to the example of spousal anger, it may be the case that acknowledging that anger before God is all that is needed. I may in my prayer time feel a sense of relief and release once I have talked it over with God. On the other hand, God might challenge me to deal with deeper problems at the root of my anger. God might reveal to me that the anger is an emotional problem I must come to terms with in my life. Or I might discern that my anger is pointing to an issue in my marriage that needs to be tended to by both my wife and me. God and I could discern then how best to approach my wife with this problem. Whatever the case may be, praying about the persistent emotions in my life will only help me to grow and become a more mature and loving person.

There is another related reason why it’s a great idea to pray with my emotions. The core of our Christian faith is our belief in an incarnate God. We believe that God loves us so much that he became one of us. He desired so much to be part of our lives that he stepped into the murky waters of humanity. Through Jesus Christ, he enters into the nitty-gritty of our lives. He is not satisfied with standing on the sidelines, cheering us when we score and bandaging us when we get hurt. No, God chooses to get in the game! And through the Holy Spirit, he chooses to get in my game. The Spirit of God wants to join me in all of my joys and sorrows, my quiet days and my raucous ones, too. But out of love, the Spirit of God respects my free will and does not enter where he is not invited. Praying over emotions, then, is saying yes to God’s offer to enter into my very heart. “Listen! I am at the door knocking,” says Jesus. “If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me” (Revelation 3:20).