Pray, for God's sake.

Prayer is an extraordinary experience. It can bring us closer to the angels than anything else in our human life, even though the prayers we say are as likely to be drearily prosaic as eloquently poetic. Yet our prayers are utterly presumptuous. We, tiny bits of protoplasm in a limitless universe, deign to speak to the Creator of all this, and we expect God to return our calls!

Our presumption, of course, is not entirely our fault. God himself in the person of Jesus Christ has, it might be said, put us up to it. He taught us to pray the Our Father and, in doing so, gave us two of the three elements that should compose our prayer life: praise and petition.

"Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven," we sing adoringly, and later we proclaim, "For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever."

But we don't neglect our own needs: "Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil," we ask.

The only element "lacking" in this perfect prayer that the God-man has given us is thanksgiving. Wouldn't it have been immodest, though, for Jesus to add, "and don't forget to say thank you"? Surely gratitude is implied and due one of whom we are asking such extraordinary favors.

Returning for a moment to the presumption of our speaking to God, some encouragement can be found in the fact that scripture scholars tell us that the word Abba for Father in the Lord's Prayer is a familiar one, closer to Daddy than to more austere forms of reverent address.

Second, there is the golden opportunity for us to speak to God through intermediaries, notably the Virgin Mary and a whole cohort of saints who presumably are more than willing to take our cases to the highest court.

As implied in the latter statement, our prayers, more often than not, are prayers of petition, "asking prayers," which we know from the specific teaching of Jesus we have no need to apologize for.

Some years ago, probably in the immediate wake of the Second Vatican Council, there were those whom we used to call "holier than the church," who looked down their noses at what they called "begging prayers," even "gimme prayers." These benighted few were apparently unaware of the psalms, nearly all of which ask and implore God for help.

And to some who distinguish condescendingly that the psalm singers were usually asking for spiritual favors, not relief from arthritic pain or for help in passing a final exam, we need only turn to the Bible stories.

One commentator has called attention to the fact that "Jesus obviously loved it when people flung themselves at him in their need, risking everything on his power and love, with no riders added to their requests: `Lord, that I may see'; `Lord, if you want to, you can make me clean.'" No subtlety there. "No careful theological qualifications in their appeals, no hedging of bets. They step out in faith, making fools of themselves in public."

And to those who scoff at asking Mary and the saints to plead our cause rather than appealing to God directly, this same commentator, Marice Boulding, offers the witness of the Old Testament:

"Old Testament tradition believed that the prayer of God's special friends on behalf of others was weighty. Abraham had pleaded with him to spare Sodom, beating down the required condition from 50 just men in the city to ten; the story is archaic and somewhat reminiscent of bargaining in a market, but the message is clear. Intercession came to be regarded as part of the vocation of a prophet."

The riches of prayer for us are boundless. Not only has Jesus encouraged us to "ask and you shall receive," but, in his own words, he has made it clear that our praise of God is warmly welcome. Our prayers of thanks, so easy to forget, complete a trilogy that makes our human life worth living.