An Atheist’s Prayers

I think I have finally found what many people in the Christianized West call “prayer.” As I grew up a Christian, making use of your special relationship with God, even if wishing for good things, seemed kind of unfair to the rest of humanity that had to struggle to attain that which is necessary and excellent. And so often, most of my requests seemed for no one else but me, a horribly selfish practice. Thus I could never “pray” much in my thoughts, that is, until I shed Christianity.

Rather than requesting something for myself by grace, or asking some unearned favor, as prayer is mostly used in Western culture today, I should go around “wishing well” upon all that I see. I’ve been practicing doing that while stuck in traffic, and it seems to help my mood at the least. Note that nothing is actually uttered by voice, only in thought. I find no need to specify agency in how these good wishes should come to pass. Also, the recipients of my good wishes hopefully remain unaware of my blessings upon them. I feel such thoughts predispose me toward greater empathy and generosity, which can then make a material difference. For when all increase, only then can someone like me who cares for y’all increase and feel good about it.

Geographical note: There is a Pray, Montana with Zip code 59065 (pray n.d.).

I’ve always considered the word “prayer” a bit funny. In recent society, it is common for a noun to become a verb, e.g. “A computer keyboard” => “to keyboard quickly and accurately.” Well, that tradition may go back a while, e.g. “Metal type” => “to type quickly and accurately”, but still… “Prayer” seemed to me to be the opposite case. “Pray” is a verb meaning to make earnest supplication, entreat, beg, plead, implore, beseech, or importune. “Pray” seemed to add the “–er” suffix serving as the regular English formative of agent nouns.

I see that I was wrong from the etymology. “Pray” comes from the Medieval Latin precari, consonant with today’s meaning. But “prayer" in the Old Latin is not the one who prays, but precaria, that thing which is obtained by requesting favor. Modern Western Christians might be more correct to term their fossil-fueled loads of booty (the positive results of praying to their God) as “prayer”, derivation of “prayary”, meaning obtained by entreaty. I suppose the imputation of the concepts of mercy or grace only came upon the results of prayer with the renaissance reformation and one of my namesakes, Martin Luther. The words “pray” and “prayer” are judicial terms, and still show up in modern courtroom documents.

Etymological notes:

On “Prayer”: [Origin: 1250–1300; ME preiere ≪ OF ≪ ML precāria, n. use of fem. of precārius obtained by entreaty, equiv. to prec- (s. of prex) prayer + -ārius -ary; cf. precarious]

On “Pray”: [Origin: 1250–1300; ME preien ≪ OF preier ≪ L precārī to beg, pray, deriv. of prex (s. prec-) prayer; akin to OE fricgan, D vragen, G fragen, Goth fraihnan to ask]

On “Precarious”: [Origin: 1640–50; ≪L precārius obtained by entreaty or mere favor, hence uncertain. See prayer]

(Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006).

It seems that the words pray and prayers are not so ancient, only arriving in the medieval age. Talk about the convergence of church and state! Above I highlighted the gothic English fricgan (to ask) to remind me of the older usage whenever I might utter “friggen” or “fricken” as euphemism for derogative “fucking” today. (I looked up “prairie” too, just for the fun of it. Though it shares the suffix “-ary”, the Latin root prat is completely different, meaning meadow.)

Reference

pray. (n.d.). U.S. Gazetteer. Retrieved November 21, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pray

Elton John Hates Religion

Finally!

It took us six years to screw the courage up to do what I've been saying since before George W. Bush was, against the popular will of the people, appointed leader of the free world.

Now the U.S. government has been restored to some semblance of balance and humanity with the Democratic takeover of congress. Now visible figures are calling for less religious incitement to hatred and conflict.

I had left the Church and turned to interfaith dialog during the relentless run-up to war after President Bush's ascension. In 2002-2003 I could not believe the sermons I was hearing from every pulpit, about how the Church has never taken a stance in questions of war. "Some support war with passages from scripture, some oppose war with verses from the same Bible."

People who voted simple-minded pro-life platforms were already guilty of assembling the most heinous imperialist government in American history. But when it came down to real questions of the quick and the dead, why only then did the Church choose to lose a grip on reality and become nothing but a spiritual, ethereal bystander?

The only thing I thought I had in common with Elton John until recently was admiration for his prolific songwriter and musical output such as "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road." Now Elton John has criticized religious leaders for failing to do anything about conflicts around the world.

"Why aren't they having a conclave? Why aren't they coming together?"

John blamed those in his own field for being similarly lax.

"It's like the peace movement in the '60s. Musicians got through to people by getting out there and doing peace concerts, but we don't seem to do them any more," he said. "If John Lennon were alive today, he'd be leading it with a vengeance." Source: MSN

Imagine!