Praying for oneself

All petitionary prayer, even the most frivolous, is at heart an expression of fear.  Fear of lack, fear of loss, fear of pain.  I recall a coworker telling me she had asked God to sell her Cadillac.  I thought that was ridiculous at the time.  I now realize she may have needed the money, or the car may have reminded her of an old relationship, or possibly she no longer wanted to appear nouveau riche.  In any case, she was afraid of something.

Some people who no longer pray do so out of fear as well.  Fear that their peers will think them superstitious, fear that prayer compromises their rationality, fear that their prayers will go unanswered.  In my experience, many people who no longer pray experience a hole in their souls which they look to fill with art, music, poetry, psychoactive drugs, ritual, sex.  Sometimes these experiences succeed in establishing a connection with interiority or ultimacy and sometimes they don't.  But if they don't people will be less likely disappointed that heaven has let them down.

I believe that praying out of fear is rational and effective even for those whose world view is entirely naturalistic (i.e. without gods or demons, heavens or hells, lives before or after).  Let me illustrate with an actual example:

I am afraid.  I have an incurable, progressive disease.  I don't want to die.  I don't want to die soon.  I don't want to die painfully.  Is there any help for me?

Once the prayer is expressed a relationship is formed between need and action.  The uncanny thing is, however, that the one who responds to the prayer is the one who is praying!  I have verbalized my fear, but I've also signed up for experimental drug trials, become part of support networks, made plans to live in a more accessible and comfortable space.  I am doing what I can to answer my own prayer.  If in fact I die, soon, and painfully, it won't be because my prayer went unanswered.  It will be because what could be done was done and the rest is up to the vagaries of nature.

I encourage people to pray for their needs, establishing a conscious link between cause and effect.  Even if our situations are so dire that we don't have the resources or energy to act on our own behalf, we are still keeping alive our dignity, our will, our desire for life -- all pointers to transcendence.  In the end we may not be cured, but just possibly our fear may be healed.