Let us pray.

"What is prayer?" I was asked this question as a teenager by an elderly man who happened to be sitting next to me at a wedding. He wanted me to see that, from his perspective, prayer was nothing but a fearful call into the abyss. While I laughed about it at the time (I was more interested in the wedding cake than prayer), the question stuck with me.

This question gets at the heart of the work of Harvard professor Robert Orsi in his books on "lived" religion and devotion. When the editors interviewed Orsi for this special book issue, many of us spent some time talking with him about what he's learned about devotion to St. Jude and prayer in particular. The Claretians, who publish U.S. CATHOLIC, are committed to fostering devotion to St. Jude (the patron saint of hopeless causes), and Orsi has done extensive field research at the Claretians' National Shrine of St. Jude in Chicago.

Orsi tells the story of his academic quest about St. Jude devotion at the shrine and once being asked by an interviewee, "Have you ever prayed to St. Jude?" When he responded that he had not, she wondered how he could possibly understand the devotion he was studying. She asked him to turn to St. Jude some day, when he needed something badly.

That day did come, and because of the particular prayer that is directed to St. Jude in times of trouble, Orsi observed for himself the "vulnerability, risk, and acceptance" that are the foundation of devotion. He recognized the "strength of will it takes simultaneously to risk hoping while conceding that I had come to the end of my own powers in the situation," as he writes in his new book, Between Heaven and Earth: The Religious Worlds People Make and the Scholars Who Study Them (Princeton).

Where the skeptics see prayer as a knee-jerk reaction to fear, Orsi saw an act of faith and courage to give over to God our hopes and needs, and in turn to trust--whatever the outcome may be--that God watches over us. See what else he has to say about traditional devotions from Catholic history in our interview, "Don't trash our past" (pages 24-28).

The editors are also pleased to share some of our favorite books ("Look what we've read lately," pages 30-33) just in time for nights of winter reading and Christmas gift shopping. And Culture in Context columnist Patrick McCormick reviews a slew of books on war and peace ("Turn the other page," pages 35-37).

Though you may not often talk about prayer with teens at weddings or have a special devotion to a saint, we know you have deep faith. At press time, as the devastation and loss of life from Hurricane Katrina is becoming all too clear, we keep all those affected by this disaster in our prayers. St. Jude, give us hope.