RE: Prayer
December 5, 2016 at 3:34 pm
(This post was last modified: December 5, 2016 at 3:35 pm by Cyberman.)
(December 5, 2016 at 3:22 pm)Catholic_Lady Wrote: If we think both are beneficial to the person, I don't see the problem or selfishness in doing both.
I know you don't; and without trying to sound condescending, that's the point.
If you truly believed that praying for a starving person is beneficial, you wouldn't offer food or some other assistance. By making their situation all about your feelings, that's selfish.
I'm not just talking rhetorically here. Back in the day, my Sam and I tried very, very hard for a baby. When we went for IVF treatment, we had people telling us how they would be praying for a successful outcome. Later, when the first round of treatment didn't take, those exact same people told us how they would pray for us again, for our peace of mind etc. Yes, they undoubtedly had the best of intentions, and there wasn't anything they could provide in practical terms; but by deciding to pray for us and making it perfectly clear to us that they were going to do so, they turned the conversation into being about them and how selfless they were.
And no, I'm not in the least bitter about this experience nor turning it into some hard-hearted crusade; so if anyone was thinking of going that route, please don't.
At the age of five, Skagra decided emphatically that God did not exist. This revelation tends to make most people in the universe who have it react in one of two ways - with relief or with despair. Only Skagra responded to it by thinking, 'Wait a second. That means there's a situation vacant.'
