A reading of an excerpt from Anne & Barry Ulanov’s book Primary Speech
“Prayer entered into seriously marks an unmistakable break with the way we have been living. It is never simply another happy little part of our lives, an attractive addition to the day or the night like a new car or a dress or a fetching new way to prepare a souffle. Prayer is struggle. But prayer, following the dictates of an imperious desire, can become a voracious appetite and in its own time, at least, become all-consuming. Deal with it frivolously and all desire for it will disappear, or it will be converted into such a mere decoration in our lives that it might be better to give those middling energies over to a more easily satisfied appetite….The desire for prayer is the desire for a meeting with truth. It is the thirst for understanding which will give purpose tot he boredom in which so many of us pass our working lives….In the desire for prayer, a wrenching need for wholeness expresses itself. we want to live our metaphysics and to experience our beliefs.”
