When I was a girl, I got on my knees beside my bed each night and said my prayers.

I prayed before eating at mealtime.

Looking back, it seems that prayer was a system, the entry ticket to forgiveness, food, and sleep, and Holy Communion at Mass each morning.

That changed for me at some point. I can’t say exactly when. But I know it was during my slog through the divorce. I was searching for God, and for meaning, everywhere. My life was a constant litany of “God, please, God please.” Those were frantic, desperate days, and prayers.

My search for Him in the wreckage carried me through three years in Seminary.

I wasn’t holy. I was angry, furious. Grief stricken. I entered that course of study demanding that God show me the purpose in the death – murder, it felt like at the time – of every dream I’d ever had.
During those three years, He covered me with grace, and let me crawl through all the broken things in my life … back to Him.

That was decades ago. What happened through the intervening years was a slow but, I see now, a clear transformation of Spiritual awakening and connection.

Praying is no longer a time-or-place-specific practice. It is everywhere. All the time. I pray as I fall asleep, my constant call to God. When I awake, He is waiting for me, and our conversation picks up where it left off the night before.

I wash my face, take my pills, feed Charlie … and all is prayer.
I turn on lights, open blinds. I eat my toast and drink my coffee. All is done in the sanctuary of my home, and in union with God. He is here. He is the constant that carries me through my walk, my talks with friends, workers, clients. He is so present that He spills quietly into the bent of conversations with everyone.
When that first started happening I was a little bit intimidated about the honesty of it. But I felt Him and stood present with Him, surrendered to His guidance. Now it’s second nature. If you know me, you know that God is present. Because … He just is.

Yes, I cuss a little. At those moments when my humanness screams for attention, I mentally look up and say, “Lord, give me just a minute. I’ll be right back.” And I let it rip. I know he understands.

Because we’re not saints down here, and He doesn’t expect us to be. He made us fully human, and in our humanness He gives us the choice to be sanctified by His mercy and grace. Or not.

I choose that sanctification. That grace.

As I load the dishwasher, do the laundry, roll the can to the curb. I choose that.

And, in my prayers, I pray I always will.

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. [Romans 8:28]