Models of prayer

The counter-example to all the other rows. Lawrence says of himself that he could never regulate his devotion by methods, and for him the set hours of prayer are only a continuation of what he does at the stove. The little book was put together after his death by Joseph de Beaufort — from conversations he himself had written down and from Lawrence’s letters.

“In the noise of my kitchen I possess God as peacefully as if I were kneeling before the Blessed Sacrament.”

Before work, a short prayer asking to remain in God’s presence. During work, familiar conversation with his Maker: he asks for grace and offers him what he is doing. After work he asks himself how it went; for what was good he gives thanks, for what was bad he asks pardon and carries on. By repeating these short acts they became a habit over the years. All forms of devotion and set prayers, except those to which his state obliges him, he gave up.

“As for my set hours of prayer, they are only a continuation of the same exercise.”

Laubach’s programme has two parts, and neither of them is half an hour of silence. The first is an hour a day with the Gospels. The second is an experiment that began in January 1930 on Mindanao: to remember God in every minute without stopping work. He himself calls it a fresh approach to Brother Lawrence.

“To call God to mind for at least one second in every sixty.”

The first of the two parts of the programme: to read the Gospels, for at least an hour a day. It is a time of its own, not a step of the game.

To choose a favourable hour and watch in how many of its minutes I remembered God at least once. Seventeen ways count: from a whispered sentence to helping someone for his sake. At first the score is low, and it grows like any habit; it is written down only now and then, and only for a single hour. It is a freedom, not a yoke. And anyone who forgets for hours or days begins again — with a smile.

The story of a nameless pilgrim who wants to know how it is possible to pray without ceasing. An elder gives him a single sentence — “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me” — and a number. It is a tale of growth over months, not a guide to half an hour. It was published in Kazan in 1881, and for the second edition it was revised by Bishop Theophan the Recluse, who also described the same stages in his own words.

“The continuous interior Jesus Prayer is a constant, never-ceasing calling upon the divine name of Jesus Christ with the lips, the mind and the heart.”

The elder first reads him an instruction on how to sit and breathe; it does not work — boredom, sleep and thoughts come. So he prescribes only the lips and a prayer rope: three thousand prayers a day, then six thousand, then twelve, no more and no fewer. After a few days the prayer wakes the pilgrim of its own accord and his tongue says it without being urged. The elder calls this a natural effect of habit, not yet grace.

“To begin with, say at least three thousand prayers each day.”

The mind begins to listen to the prayer, and at times the heart of itself feels a certain warmth. Theophan describes this as the second degree: the mind grows used to collecting itself at the hour of prayer and to saying the whole of it consciously. Attention merges with the word and speaks it as its own.

“The second degree is attentive prayer: the mind grows used to collecting itself at the hour of prayer and to saying the whole of it consciously, without being scattered.”

On the road to Siberia the words attach themselves to the beating of the heart; the pilgrim stops moving his lips and listens. Later he practises this deliberately: eyes closed, the gaze turned towards the heart, the first half of the prayer with the in-breath, the second with the out-breath. Of such techniques Theophan adds that they are not for everyone — only one thing is obligatory: to stand with attention in the heart.

“Of its own accord the prayer began to pass into the heart. I stopped saying it with my lips and began to listen attentively to what my heart was saying.”

A prayer of the heart that does not cease by day or in sleep and runs alongside work, reading and conversation. Theophan calls it spiritual prayer and a gift.

“When the feeling of prayer rises to being continuous, spiritual prayer begins, which is the gift of the Spirit of God praying for us — the last degree of prayer that can be grasped.”

Teresa does not number steps and prescribes no method — she speaks of “her way of praying”. The order in the row is put together from what she advises her sisters in The Way of Perfection and from what she tells about herself in The Book of Her Life. The last pill is no longer a step: quiet may come in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer, right at the start, or not at all. And according to her, no one should climb higher unless God himself lifts them up.

“The important thing is not to think much, but to love much; do, then, whatever most arouses you to love.”

Teresa does not explain this; she takes it as the familiar beginning: examination of conscience, the confession of sins and the sign of the cross. Straight afterwards she advises you to find company — and the best company is the one who taught the prayer.

“As you know, the first things must be examination of conscience, confession of sin and the signing of yourself with the Cross.”

For anyone who, like her, cannot reason things out or hold their thoughts, a book is a companion and a shield that takes the blows of the many thoughts. It serves not study but recollection — which is why she advises her sisters to take a good book in their mother tongue. For eighteen years she did not dare to begin without a book, except after Communion.

“I never dared begin to pray without a book.”

The soul collects all its faculties and enters within itself to be there with its God, and it closes the door behind it on everything else. Teresa insists that this is nothing supernatural: it depends on our will, and with God’s help we can do it. Anyone who takes care over it will manage it in a year, perhaps in half a year.

“It is called recollection because the soul collects together all the faculties and enters within itself to be with its God.”

To picture the Lord beside you and to choose the scene according to how you feel: if you are glad, the risen Lord; if you are sad, the way to the Garden, the pillar or the cross. Teresa asks for neither many thoughts nor subtle reflections. After thinking a little, the understanding should grow quiet and one should stay with him: looking at him who is looking at me.

“I am asking you only to look at Him.”

To speak with him now in one way and now in another: to ask, to complain, to rejoice. Or to say the Lord’s Prayer, knowing who taught this prayer and to whom I am saying it — according to Teresa, vocal prayer of this kind already is inner prayer. Even if one were to say it only once in an hour.

“Speak with Him as with a Father, a Brother, a Lord and a Spouse.”

The Lord brings the soul into peace by his presence. The will is held captive; understanding and memory remain free and may wander — one should pay no attention to them. It cannot and should not be prolonged: at most a gentle word, like someone giving a little puff to a candle that has gone out. And whoever has not been given quiet should not stand and wait, but go on asking.

“This is a supernatural state, and, however hard we try, we cannot reach it for ourselves.”

In the spring of 1841 Müller reversed the order he had kept for at least ten years: instead of prayer straight after dressing, Scripture first. The first concern of the day, he says, is not how much he will do for the Lord, but that his own soul should be happy in the Lord. Verse by verse he looks for food for himself, not for matter for a sermon — and after a few minutes the meditation turns into prayer. He writes that he never read this in any book.

“Now what is the food for the inner man? Not prayer, but the word of God.”

To ask the Lord in a few words to bless his word. Nothing more — and to begin reading straight away.

Early in the morning he reads the New Testament from the beginning, verse by verse, often outdoors while walking.

“…searching, as it were, into every verse, to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of the public ministry of the Word; not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon; but for the sake of obtaining food for my own soul.”

Mere reading, in which the word only passes through the mind like water through a pipe, is not enough. What has been read is to be considered, pondered and applied to one’s own heart.

“…not the simple reading of the word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts.”

After a few minutes the verse leads him to confession, to thanksgiving, to intercession or to supplication — in any order. Then he goes on to the next verse, turning everything into prayer for himself or for others as he goes. By breakfast time he is almost always in a peaceful, if not happy, state of heart.

“I speak to my Father, and to my Friend (vile though I am, and unworthy of it!) about the things that He has brought before me in His precious word.”

A guide written for the barber Peter Beskendorf: in it Luther describes how he himself prays. The order is his own — first, then, finally — but he binds no one to it: he changes his words from day to day, and for the sake of one petition he will happily let the other six go. He twists the garland from the Ten Commandments only if he has time, and the text does not settle whether after the Lord’s Prayer or before it. Listening to the Spirit is not a step: it may interrupt the prayer anywhere.

“For there the Holy Spirit himself is preaching, and one word of his sermon is better than a thousand of our prayers.”

When he feels that other business and thoughts have made him cold and disinclined to pray, he takes his Psalter, goes to his room or to church and says aloud to himself the Ten Commandments, the Creed and, as time allows, some sayings of Christ, of Paul, or psalms. When the heart has been warmed, he kneels or stands with folded hands and in the shortest possible prayer admits that he does not deserve to be heard — and that he prays because God has commanded it and promised to hear.

“I take my little Psalter, run into my chamber or, if it is the day and hour, into church among the people, and begin to say aloud to myself the Ten Commandments, the Creed and, as I have time, some sayings of Christ, of Paul, or psalms — just as the children do.”

First the whole Lord’s Prayer, word for word. Then he goes back to one petition or to several and enlarges on each in his own words; he gives a model for all seven. But the models are not to be recited: he himself says it one way today and another tomorrow. And one should not leave the prayer before having said to oneself that it has been heard — that is what Amen means.

“To this day I suckle at the Lord’s Prayer like a child, and drink and eat from it like an old man, and cannot get my fill of it.”

If he has time, he takes one commandment after another and twists out of each a garland of four strands. The first strand is instruction: to take the commandment as it stands and consider what God so earnestly requires of me in it. A psalm or a chapter of Scripture can be taken in the same way — as a flint to strike fire in the heart.

“I take each commandment first as instruction, which is what it is in itself, and consider what our Lord God so earnestly requires of me in it.”

The second strand: to turn the same commandment into a thanksgiving. When Luther sums up all four strands at the end, he calls this one a “song book”.

The third strand: to turn the same commandment into a confession — to confess where I have acted against it.

The fourth strand: to turn the same commandment into a petition. In this way, Luther says, the Ten Commandments are four things at once: a book of instruction, a song book, a book of confession and a prayer book. A piece or half a piece is enough, if it kindles a little fire in the heart.

“A good prayer should not be long, nor drawn out, but frequent and ardent.”

It often happens to him that at one petition he strays into such rich thoughts that he lets the other six go. Then the other prayers should be let go, room made for these thoughts, and one should listen in silence. With the Ten Commandments he repeats it: be still and listen to him who can do it better than you — and what he preaches, note it and write it down.

“Be still and listen to him who can do it better than you.”

A Carthusian’s letter to his fellow monk Gervase gave names to four rungs that today go by the name of lectio divina. Guigo writes that the rungs follow one another “in time and in causality”, and he shows it on a single verse. At the same time they are stages of people: the first belongs to beginners, the second to the proficient, the third to the devout, the fourth to the blessed. And after contemplation one comes down — to whichever of the lower rungs place and time allow.

“Reading seeks, meditation finds, prayer asks, contemplation tastes.”

A careful examination of Scripture with the whole attention of the mind. Reading “seeks”: it sets solid food to the mouth, stays at the rind of the text and supplies the matter for the next step. Guigo’s example begins with a single verse that he hears — hearing, too, counts as reading for him.

“Reading is the diligent examination of the Scriptures with the mind’s full attention.”

The strenuous work of the mind which, guided by reason, searches for hidden truth: it goes inside the verse, weighs every word, brings in other passages of Scripture. Meditation “finds” and “chews”. It kindles desire, but it cannot give the sweetness it shows — reading and meditating are open to the good and the bad alike. So it sends us on, to prayer.

“Meditation is the mind’s studious activity, searching out knowledge of hidden truth under the guidance of its own reason.”

The heart turns to God and asks. The soul sees that by itself it cannot reach what meditation has shown; it humbles itself and begs at least for a drop of heavenly rain. Prayer “asks” and gets the flavour.

“Prayer is the heart’s devout reaching toward God, that evils be taken away and good things obtained.”

The mind is lifted above itself and tastes; contemplation is “the sweetness itself”. It is not done: God does not wait for the prayer to end; he breaks into the middle of it. It lasts only briefly, grace hides itself again — and the soul should then calmly come down to one of the three lower rungs.

“He does not wait until they have finished speaking, but breaks into the middle of the prayer and hastens to enter.”

John gives no method for an hour of prayer. He describes a passage that happens once in a lifetime and takes months or years: from the meditation of beginners to a simple loving attention. One does not choose it; one recognises it by three signs. And John points out that God does not lead everyone this way — not even half of those who strive for the spiritual life.

“Let the spiritual person learn to be still in God, fixing his loving attention upon Him, in the calm of his understanding.”

The state of beginners: reasoning and imagining. It is a remote means by which the senses grow used to spiritual things, and it should not be left too early. With every act of meditation the soul gains a little knowledge and love; many acts form a habit.

Three signs, all at once: the person can no longer meditate and finds no taste in it as before; he has no wish to fix the imagination on anything else either; and he likes to remain alone, in loving attention to God. The first sign alone may be distraction, the first two melancholy. In the time of transition the two alternate: one begins with gentle meditation, and as soon as the quiet comes, one stops.

“…it takes pleasure in being alone with loving attention to God, without any particular consideration, in inward peace and quiet and rest.”

Five steps for one quiet time, morning and evening. Keller put them together from Luther and from the Puritan John Owen: the meditation is Luther’s garland, Word prayer his paraphrased Lord’s Prayer, and contemplation the moment when Luther stops and listens. He himself adds that the plans are not to be followed to the letter.

“Prayer is both a conversation in words and a deep encounter with God.”

Before speaking, one should remind oneself to whom one is speaking and on what footing one comes: the Father has adopted us, the Son has opened the way, the Spirit helps. And one should ask for God’s presence — with a verse, a psalm or a tried written prayer of the Church.

The bridge between Bible reading and prayer. Study has its own time; here one truth is taken from what has been read and worked through in Luther’s way: what does it lead me to praise, what to confess, what to ask for? And with Owen one stays with it until the heart is engaged, not only the mind.

Before praying freely, one prays the text: one turns into prayer what was found in meditation, prays a psalm, or paraphrases the Lord’s Prayer petition by petition, as Luther taught.

Only now to pour out what is on one’s heart — and to keep the balance of three kinds of prayer: upward (praise and thanks), inward (self-examination and confession) and outward (petition and intercession).

No technique, but the moment when a truth a person knows becomes a truth he feels; for this Keller borrows Jonathan Edwards’s language of seeing and tasting. It need not come. Then the prayer ends with thanks and wonder at what God has shown.

Lewis wrote no guide and several times refuses to prescribe anything. The row puts together habits he gave away about himself in letters to an invented friend. Only two things have an order of his own: the prayer for the real I belongs at the very beginning, and the festoons follow the petitions of the Lord’s Prayer. Adoration is a habit of the whole day, and prayer without words a gift for good moments.

“For many years after my conversion I used no set prayers apart from the Lord’s Prayer. In fact I tried to pray without words — not to put spiritual movements into words at all.”

Before Lewis asks for anything, he asks for one thing: that it may really be he who speaks, and really God to whom he speaks. In doing so he lays aside the hazy notion that stands in for God, and the picture he has made of himself. It is the only part of his prayer to which he himself assigns a place — it belongs at the very beginning.

“Let it be my real self that speaks. Let it be the real You I am speaking to.”

Lewis does not avoid ready-made prayers; he hangs his own festoons on them: private overtones hung on a petition in such a way that they do not drown out its plain public sense. At “thy kingdom come” he thinks of his heart, his college, England and the world; at “thy will be done” not only of what he has to bear but also of what he has to do. He recommends it to no one, and the festoons change.

To pray means to let oneself be known as a person. So what is to be brought before God is what really fills the mind — petitions and guilt alike. Wishes that one shuts out of prayer become the loudest distraction. Lewis also intercedes for people without names: for the waitress, for “that man”.

“We must lay before Him what is in us, not what ought to be in us.”

To begin where I am: not with great thoughts about creation and redemption, but with the cold water of a brook on my face. Every pleasure can be read as a message, so that to have it and to adore are one and the same; gratitude looks at the gift, adoration runs back up the sunbeam to the sun. It is a habit of the whole day, not a step of prayer — and Lewis admits that he manages it only now and then.

“These clean, spontaneous joys are little patches of God’s light in the woods of our experience.”

For years this was his main way, and he still holds it to be the best — if it can really be achieved. But to make it his daily bread meant relying on more strength than he has: words are an anchor. When God grants prayer without words, only a fool would refuse it; but he does not give it every day. And Lewis adds expressly that he does not mean by it the mystics’ “prayer of silence”.

Four steps after the letters of the word PRAY, laid over the Lord’s Prayer. Greig writes that he dislikes acronyms but that this one works — and that these are not the rungs of a ladder but the steps of a dance. Morning prayer in the Lectio 365 app has the same outline; night prayer is based on the examen.

Pause, Rejoice, Ask, Yield.

Prayer begins when a person stops. He puts down the wish list, sits quietly and becomes present where he is, so that scattered senses may centre on God again. Stillness prepares prayer — and is itself already prayer.

The natural response to God’s presence is reverence. It is not to be skipped: first linger over what God has given, and only then ask for more. Greig calls it the most important and the most enjoyable dimension of prayer.

At its simplest prayer is asking for help: for oneself and for others, from daily bread to the kingdom of God. The same section of the book also deals with prayer that has gone unanswered.

The last step is surrender — a clenched fist that opens. A person yields to God’s presence in contemplation and in listening to his word, to his holiness in confession and reconciliation, to his power in spiritual warfare. With children one can simply say “yes” instead of “yield”.

The most precisely described hour of prayer in the whole chart. Ignatius lists the parts of one exercise and insists that the preparatory prayer and the preludes come before every meditation. Yet the text also has two safeguards against mechanical praying: where I find what I am looking for, there I stay — and it is not much knowledge that satisfies the soul. The exercise should last a full hour, rather more than less.

“It is not much knowledge that fills and satisfies the soul, but the inner feeling and relish of things.”

A step or two from the place of prayer, to stand for the space of an Our Father, raise the mind and consider how God is looking at me; then to make an act of reverence. The preparatory prayer is always the same: to ask that all my intentions and actions may be directed purely to the service and praise of God.

“…my intellect raised on high, considering how God our Lord is looking at me.”

To see with the sight of the imagination the place where what I want to contemplate happens: a temple, a mountain, a road. With an invisible subject, such as sin, an image of my own condition. In contemplations on the life of Christ this is preceded by a brief recalling of the story.

“…to see with the sight of the imagination the corporeal place where the thing is found which I want to contemplate.”

The request follows the subject matter: with the risen Christ to ask for joy, with the suffering Christ for sorrow and tears. When contemplating the Incarnation, for interior knowledge of the Lord, so that I may love and follow him more.

“…to ask for interior knowledge of the Lord, Who for me has become man, that I may more love and follow Him.”

In a meditation three powers are at work: memory recalls the matter, understanding goes through it, the will lets itself be moved. In a contemplation of the Gospel the points are three ways of looking — to see the persons, to hear what they say, to watch what they do — and to draw some profit from each. Where I find what I am looking for, there I stay.

“In the Point in which I find what I want, there I will rest, without being anxious to pass on, until I content myself.”

Free speech with Christ on the cross, with the Father or with Mary: now asking for a grace, now accusing oneself of some wrong, now confiding one’s affairs and asking for advice. In the first exercise with three questions — what I have done for Christ, what I am doing, what I ought to do.

“The Colloquy is made, properly speaking, as one friend speaks to another, or as a servant to his master.”

The exercise ends with an Our Father. Then, for a quarter of an hour, sitting or walking, to look at how the prayer went: if badly, to look for the cause and be sorry; if well, to give thanks and do the same next time.

A “short method” for someone who lives in the world and does not know how to pray: an hour a day, preferably in the morning. The steps follow one another, but Francis himself adds that the order is only an aid — when the heart is moved straight after the preparation, it should be given free rein. Only the resolutions are to stay at the end.

“Then, Philothea, you must give it free rein, without trying to follow the method I have given you.”

Four ways of placing yourself in the presence of God — one is enough, briefly and simply: God is everywhere; God is in a special way in my heart; the Saviour looks down from heaven on those who pray; or to picture him beside you. Then the soul bows down, acknowledges that it does not deserve to stand here, and asks for the grace to pray well. Sometimes a third point follows: to picture the mystery as if it were taking place before me.

“O my heart, my heart, God is truly here.”

The work of the understanding: one or several considerations meant to move the heart. If the mind finds enough taste, light and fruit in one of them, it stays there and goes no further; if not, after trying for a while it passes calmly on to another. Without hurry.

“…like the bees, which do not leave a flower so long as they find honey to gather there.”

Meditation pours good movements into the will: love of God and of neighbour, the desire for heaven, compassion, trust, shame over one’s past life. Whenever they come, room should be made for them — whether they arrive before the considerations or after them.

General movements of the heart are not enough. The wish to forgive one’s enemies is a small thing until it becomes a decision: I will no longer let myself be provoked by the unpleasant words of this or that neighbour. Resolutions are made only after the affections, at the end of the meditation.

“Yet, Philothea, you must not dwell so long on these general affections that you fail to turn them into special and particular resolutions for your own correction and amendment.”

Three acts, made as humbly as possible: to give thanks for the affections and resolutions God has given; to offer them together with the merits of his Son; to ask for the grace to carry them out and to intercede for the Church, its pastors, relatives and friends. Finally the Our Father and the Hail Mary.

On leaving prayer, to gather a little nosegay from the considerations and to smell it all day long: one, two or three thoughts that spoke to you most.

“Whoever walks in a beautiful garden does not like to leave without picking a few flowers.”

The chapter The Day Alone from the little book Bonhoeffer wrote after his experience with the preachers’ seminary at Finkenwalde. Three things need a fixed time in the day: meditation on Scripture, prayer and intercession. They follow one another and build on each other, but it is not a technique — spiritual experiments, he says, have no place here, and intercession may well take up the whole time. Bonhoeffer expects no contemplative stage: one keeps silence for the sake of the Word.

“There are three things for which the Christian needs a fixed time alone during the day: meditation on Scripture, prayer, and intercession.”

One keeps silence before hearing the Word, because one’s thoughts are already turned towards it, and after it, because it is still speaking within. It is not a mystical going-beyond the Word but a simple growing still beneath it — and nobody should expect anything from it but a meeting with God’s Word. The meditation then begins with a prayer that God would send his Spirit through his Word.

“We are silent in the early morning of the day because God should have the first word, and we are silent before going to sleep because the last word also belongs to God.”

A short chosen text, perhaps the same one for a whole week: in common worship one reads in breadth, here in depth. It is read as a word for me personally and for this very day — it is not exegesis, sermon preparation or study. New thoughts are not needed, and empty times are not to be taken too seriously. The ground rule: seek God, not joy.

“It is not necessary that we get through the whole text in our meditation. Often we shall have to stay with a single sentence or even a single word, because it holds us, confronts us, and we can no longer evade it.”

To pray on the basis of a word of Scripture, so as not to fall prey to one’s own emptiness: for clarity for this day, for preservation from sin, for growth in holiness, for faithfulness and strength for one’s work. Thoughts that wander off are not to be pulled back by force; the people and events they wander to are to be drawn into the prayer.

“Meditation on Scripture leads into prayer.”

Particular people and particular difficulties, first of all those I live with. There is no dislike and no tension that could not be overcome in intercession; a community lives from the intercession of its members, or it perishes.

“To make intercession means nothing other than to bring the brother before God, to see him under the cross of Jesus as a poor human being and sinner in need of grace.”

Every day brings many hours alone in the midst of an unchristian environment. That is where it will show whether the time of meditation has led a person into an unreal world, from which he wakes with a start when he goes back to his work, or into the real world of God.

“This is the time of testing. This is the test of a true time of meditation and of true Christian community.”

The order which the Unity approved at the Synod of Žeravice in 1616 and which Comenius published again in Amsterdam in 1660. It describes the day in a minister’s house, where future ministers were also trained; for the households of members a simpler rule is enough: to set aside time in the morning, at noon and in the evening, before and after meals — for prayer, singing and the reading of Scripture. This is the book Zinzendorf found in 1727 and read to Herrnhut.

“At the signal of the bell all rise; washed and dressed, they praise God together on bended knees. Then each betakes himself to reading and meditation on sacred things.”

The day begins with a bell. All rise, wash and dress — and the first thing they do is to praise God together on their knees.

After the praise each one goes by himself to the reading of sacred things.

The order names reading and meditation in one breath; they last about an hour, until the next signal.

At the second signal the whole household meets, servants included. After a psalm or hymn a portion of Scripture is read and expounded, and all are encouraged to praise God and to call upon him — led by the minister or by the one whose turn it is that day.

The morning belongs to study, the afternoon to manual work. Yet at two o’clock all assemble again for prayers — after the example of the apostles — and then return to their work.

The time after supper belongs to music and the singing of psalms. Evening prayers conclude the day, and each one goes to rest.

Four English words whose initial letters spell ACTS. Who coined the acronym is not known: the earliest attestation that could be found dates from 1883, and even then it is spoken of as something familiar — as a rule by which a minister should compose the principal prayer of public worship. The list of four is older; the same four words in the same order stand in an English sermon of 1800.

“This should begin with Adoration, proceed to Confession, rise into Thanksgiving and close with Supplication.”

The first letter. According to the rule, prayer should begin with adoration.

The second letter. After adoration one proceeds to confession.

The third letter. Prayer should rise into thanksgiving.

The fourth letter. Prayer closes with supplication.

A handbook for anyone who has to pray in his own words — chiefly aloud and in front of others. For every part Henry supplies a store of biblical sentences. He numbers the parts and links them with the words “having…, we must next…”, but straight away in the preface he adds that the order may be varied just like the words: thanksgiving may come before confession and intercession before petition, as in the Lord’s Prayer.

“A golden thread of heart-prayer must run through the web of the whole Christian life.”

The first part of prayer is the address to God: to compose the spirit, to set the Lord before you and to adore him — with acknowledgment of who he is and with requests that prepare the prayer.

After the glory that is due to God comes the shame that is due to us: the confession of sin.

“Having given glory to God, which is His due, we must next take shame to ourselves, which is our due.”

After confession come the petitions for oneself: to seek the remedy from God.

“Having opened the wounds of sin, both the guilt of it, and the power of it, and its remainders in us, we must next seek unto God for the remedy.”

One does not come to the throne of grace only to seek God’s favour, but also so that God may receive the glory due to his name.

Jesus taught his disciples to pray not only with others but also for others. Henry reminds us that in this part fervour must not drop.

“Our Lord Jesus hath taught us to pray, not only with, but for others.”

To sum up the prayer, to ask for acceptance and for pardon of what was amiss in it, and to end with praise.

“We cannot be always praying, we must come down from this mount.”

Five points that can be gone through in a few minutes. They do not belong to the hour of meditation; they stand beside it — and instead of a text they go through the day that has passed. They begin with thanks and end with a resolution and the Lord’s Prayer.

“To ask account of our soul from the hour that we rose up to the present Examen, hour by hour.”

The first point: to give thanks to God for the benefits I have received.

The second point: to ask for grace to know my sins and to be rid of them.

The third point: to ask account of the soul, from getting up until this moment, hour by hour or period by period. First the thoughts, then the words, then the deeds.

The fourth point: to ask God’s pardon for the faults.

The fifth point: to resolve to amend — with his grace. Finally the Lord’s Prayer.

Cassian brought to the West what he had heard from the Egyptian monks. Following 1 Tim 2:1 he distinguishes four kinds of prayer and asks himself whether they come one after another. His answer is that all of them are useful to everyone and that a person’s changing movements of heart bring now one, now another — yet the first belongs rather to beginners and the fourth to those whose conscience is clear. Above the four kinds stands the Lord’s Prayer, and above it a prayer without words. For the whole day he recommends a single verse: “O God, make speed to save me.”

“…until his whole life and every movement of the heart become one continuous prayer.”

A plea for forgiveness: someone struck with sorrow over what he is doing or has done asks for mercy. It belongs chiefly to beginners, who are still stung by the memory of their own faults.

“Supplication is an imploring or petition concerning sins, in which one who is sorry for his present or past deeds asks for pardon.”

Here the word oratio does not mean prayer in general but a vow: I do not ask, I offer. We “pray” when we renounce the world and promise God that we will serve him, keep purity and patience, and root out anger. It belongs to those who are already making progress in virtue.

“Prayers are those by which we offer or vow something to God.”

Requests for others — for those who are dear to us and for the peace of the whole world — made in fervour of spirit. It belongs to those who fulfil their vows in deeds and whom love has moved towards the weakness of others.

“In the third place stand intercessions, which we are wont to offer up for others also, while we are filled with fervour of spirit.”

The mind recalls God’s past gifts, sees the present ones and looks forward to those that are prepared — and gives thanks in ineffable rapture. It belongs to those whose conscience has been cleansed.

“Then in the fourth place there stand thanksgivings which the mind in ineffable transports offers up to God.”

After the four kinds comes a still higher state: to address God as Father. Cassian goes through the Lord’s Prayer petition by petition — and says that it lifts those who pray it to a prayer that only very few know.

No voice, no movement of the tongue: in an instant the mind pours out more than it could afterwards put into words. It may be set off by a verse of a psalm while singing, by a brother’s voice, by a conference with an elder or by someone’s death. Cassian does not prescribe it — he only says that very few have tasted it.

“…to that fiery prayer which is known and experienced by very few and which, to speak more precisely, is ineffable.”

The oldest order of monastic prayer described in detail: this, according to John Cassian, is how they prayed in Egypt in the evening and at night. It is common prayer, not personal prayer — but its core is silent. After every psalm they stand up and keep silence, and that is where most of the time goes. The whole thing is repeated twelve times, followed by two readings, from the Old and the New Testament.

“They think it best for the prayers to be short and offered up very frequently.”

One brother stands up and chants a psalm; the others sit and listen intently. Long psalms are divided into two or three sections with prayer in between. What matters is not the number of verses but understanding.

“They consider it better for ten verses to be sung with understanding and thought than for a whole Psalm to be poured forth with a bewildered mind.”

After the psalm all rise and pray in silence. Then for the briefest possible moment they cast themselves to the ground, rise at once and stand with outstretched hands, still intent on prayer. Lying on the ground for long is discouraged: wandering thoughts and sleep come with it.

“Before they bend their knees they pray for a few moments, and while they are standing up spend the greater part of the time in prayer.”

The one who leads the prayer finally “collects” it — he speaks it on behalf of all. When he rises from the ground, all rise; no one kneels earlier and no one stays longer, lest it should look as if he were praying on his own and not with the others.

A model that has no phases, only shifts. In August 1727 at Herrnhut, a settlement of exiles from Moravia and Bohemia on Count Zinzendorf’s estate, twenty-four brothers and twenty-four sisters divided the hours of day and night among themselves by lot. The fire on the altar, they held, must never go out. The 24-7 Prayer movement looks back to this prayer watch.

“On August 26th, twenty-four Brethren and the same number of Sisters, met and covenanted together, to continue from one midnight to the next, in prayer.”

Each one prays in his own hour and in his own place. Soon there were seventy-seven intercessors. Because nothing at Herrnhut was to be forced, the rule was that whoever could not fill the whole hour with prayer might sing spiritual songs and hymns of praise. Once a week the intercessors met and were given news from near and far: for whom and for what to pray, and what to give thanks for.

“If any one could not spend the whole hour in prayer…, he might sing spiritual songs and hymns of praise to the Lord.”