My main inner practice is meditation, not prayer. However, anyone can pray. Adherents of the monotheist faiths can address the single deity in Whom they believe. But anyone else may, especially in extremis, address:
"God, if You exist..."
"To Whom it may concern..."
"Whatever gods may be..."
"An unknown God..."
The second of these formulations is used in James Blish's The Quincunx Of Time. (See here.) In Blish's Fallen Star, someone prays, "'God of the monobloc, if You exist and if You are still mindful of man..."
Poul Anderson's Robert Anderson prays:
Some monotheists would say that God receives such prayers whereas others emphatically deny it.
Reality, whether personal or personified, remains reality.
I was struck by a passage in a short story by CS Lewis. See Shadow And Night and Poul Anderson And CS Lewis and formulated a prayer in response.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
And I would be one of those who say God DOES "hears" or receives such prayers.
Historians might note dryly that Pericles, de facto ruler of Athens during the period the Acropolis/Parthenon was being rebuilt, took the money for that from the treasury of the Delian League. Funds set aside only for military purposes.
Ad astra! Sean
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