Photo Prayer
Several years ago I happened upon a method of praying that has become a daily practice. It began with the Divine Mercy image, the now well-known picture of Christ with red and pale rays streaming from His Heart. I had become accustomed to praying before the large image of the Divine Mercy that hung in my office, imagining myself in the midst of those rays as I intoned the familiar prayer, “Oh Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fountain of mercy for us, I trust in you.”
On this particular day I was praying for a family member, and I found myself mentally placing him in the rays, asking the Lord to let him stay there all day to be soaked and saturated with grace in this outpouring of God’s mercy. Looking for a way to remember this intention throughout the day, I dug up a photo of him and stuck it in the corner of the frame so that it was right below the rays – a visual reminder that would prompt me to renew my prayer each time I looked up and noticed it.
It made my prayer seem so much more real that I soon purchased a much larger, unframed image. I glued it to a thick piece of cardboard and, within a few weeks, there were pictures tacked all over it: my wife and children, other family members, the Pope, special friends, anyone I wanted to remember to pray for.
A variation of this photo prayer soon emerged. My wife and I decided to assign a specific day of the week to pray in a special way for each of our children (very easy to do since there are 7 of them). So we gathered photos of each and set up a little “prayer table” on which we could display a different photo each day. This became especially powerful during Lent, as it prompted me to also give up something specific for each child on his or her prayer day.
But as meaningful as these two types of prayer were, the next variation that evolved proved to be the most fruitful for me and has become a permanent part of my daily prayer life. Years earlier I had learned that praying the Liturgy of the Hours (the 4-volume set of prayers known also as the Divine Office) is not reserved exclusively for priests and religious, but can be a fruitful practice of daily prayer for laity as well. I especially love to “pray the Office” in front of the Blessed Sacrament during Eucharistic adoration. One day, concerned about a friend who was in need of prayer, I found a photo of her and put it in my breviary so I would remember to pray for her the next morning at adoration. It was the first of many photos that I now keep in my breviary.(It doesn’t have to be a breviary; any prayer book or prayer journal would serve the purpose just as well.)
How do I pray using the photos?
I just look at them. “Prayer,” wrote St. Therese, “is a surge of the heart.” I just look at the pictures, one by one, and let my heart surge to God for each person. A photo captures much of the essence of a person. As I gaze at each photo, the person it represents becomes present to me, complete with personality traits, strengths, weaknesses, memories, conversations, specific needs, etc. Sometimes actual words of prayer come to mind and are offered; sometimes there are no words. Essentially I am simply lifting each person up to God in whatever way and for whatever period of time seems called for. It varies from day to day. Sometimes a brief glance and momentary entrustment of the person to God is sufficient. At other times, the same photo may bring a flood of thoughts and a longer period of prayer. I just let it happen, trusting that the Holy Spirit is directing it all.
I am now in the habit of carrying a small digital camera with me when I travel; and when someone asks for prayer, I say, “Sure! Say “cheese.”
He “fathers-forth”
“I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator …” (Apostles Creed)
Ever notice that in this prayer God is referred to first of all as “Father” and only then as “creator”? There’s a whole teaching here. Pope John Paul II, in Rich in Mercy, explains that God is not just the creator, but “He is also Father,” and He is linked to us “by a bond still more intimate than that of creation. It is love, which not only creates the good but also grants participation in the very life of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. For he who loves desires to give himself” (#7).
God doesn’t create as an all-powerful but distant artisan with no real interest in His creations. He “fathers-forth” from His heart, not just creating beings, but begetting children who are to be His own. Lovingly and tenderly he forms each of us in our mothers’ wombs, fashioning us in His own image and likeness, and breathing His Spirit into us, so that one day we may return to Him “holy and spotless” to live like Him and with Him forever. For “such is the ‘plan of his loving kindness,’ conceived by the Father before the foundation of the world” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #257).
What should our response be to such a gift? To simply live as His children, trusting that His love never changes, His fathering never ends. In the midst of life’s busyness, we can rest in His heart, trusting and rejoicing and giving thanks, letting our daily lives form an endless song of praise.
“He fathers-forth whose beauty is beyond change. Praise Him”(Hopkins, Pied Beauty).
Hands Empty
Whenever I feel anxious about something, or start something new, or catch myself writing scripts for God, I hold my hands out in front of me (at least mentally) and let this phrase run thru my mind over and over: “hands empty and cupped to receive” (Iain Matthew, The Impact of God). It’s really just another way of saying “Fiat” or “Thy will be done.” It helps me to remember that God is God and I’m not; that God is always loving, always blessing, always giving, and that instead of trying to manipulate events, I can simply trust Him and learn to live in joyous expectation at the unfolding of each new moment, cupping my hands to receive the now of the gift.
