To those who say they do not pray, I say they don’t understand prayer as the opening of our spirit/soul/self to “That Which Is Beyond Us As More Than Meets The Eye.” To that which has always been called “God.” But “God” has been co-opted by theology to mean the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Jesus, so when we say “God” everyone thinks we mean That God. But no. GOD is so much more than That God, and we are left with referring to THAT GOD as “That which has always been called God.” And which now can be thought of as The Mystery beyond life and being, and prayer is opening ouselves to the Presence of the Mystery of That Which Has Always Been Called “God.” Which is the Sacred Source of Life and Being–the Numinous Reality which primal peoples experienced and referred to as “God.”

We might think of prayer as communion with the Mystery, the Sacred Source of Life and Being, which is not so much thought as experienced, felt, perceived. So that prayer is the bodily-felt experience of being with the Mystery, which I also equate with Tao, Psyche, Intuition. And which is so much more than heaven and hell and faith, which is nothing more than an opinion that takes itself seriously. The God of heaven and Hell is a God that must be believed in. The Mystery of Tao, Psyche, Intuition can be known in our body. We feel the presence of Intuition (Which I think of as the interface between us and Psyche and us and Tao), but it isn’t theology-based so much as body-based. We don’t have to be told to believe in our Intuition. We experience our Intuition. We KNOW Intuition (and Psyche, and Tao).

This is the dfference between the God of Theology and the God Before and Beyond Theology: Where do we turn when we have nowhere to turn? Before we think/reason our way there? That would be the unmovable spot, the ground and foundation of where we know our help comes from. This is “the still point of the turning world” (W.B. Yeats). The Axis Mundi, the World Axis that anchors all of us around the world throughout time. Prayer is the connection with that source of life and being which stabilizes us, restores us, returns us to our balance and harmony in order to do what needs to be done here, now in each situation as it arises.

Prayer is also a mirror reflecting how it is with us on the spiritual level. Prayer reveals to us what is important to us. Prayer reflects what we want, what we fear and exposes what we think about the nature of the universe and the character of God, and is a pointer to our degree of hope and despair. We pray like a fish swims, and is what we do, where we go, in response to the circumstances of our life. And we don’t pray becaue prayer “works,” we pray as a natural response to the circumstances of our life: “Help! Thankyou! I’m Sorry! Wow!” voices to no one in particular but to the grounding foundation of life and being.

Formulating verbal prayers articulates what is imiportant to us, says what is true about us and what is true about the here and now of o ur experience/existence, and makes conscioius what needs to be made conscious, enabling us to see what’s what and know how it is with us and what needs to be done, helping to square ourselves up with how things are with us here, now, moment to moment within the context and circumstances of our life.

We can pray without theology, without belief in God, as a way of communingn with That Which Has Always Been Called God. We pray as a way of communing with Tao, Psyche, Intuition, reaching out to that which is beyond us, which is more than we are, which grounds and sustains us and. helps us face what a must be faced and to do what must be done throughout the time left for living.