When words don't come, use the familiar ones
An Our Father said slowly is worth more than a thousand phrases that won't come.
There are days when you want to pray and nothing comes: your mind is blank, not a single word of your own. That's fine. That is what the traditional prayers are for: an Our Father, a Hail Mary, a short phrase repeated slowly. They lend you the words you cannot find.
The key is not the formula, but the heart. It is not "moving your lips" quickly, but truly meaning what you say, even if they are learned words. Said calmly, those prayers open the door, and often personal intimacy follows.
Do not look at them as something for children. They accompany you all through life: when you do not know how to pray, when you are tired, when pain leaves you without a voice. Start there and let God do the rest.
Key idea
The traditional prayers, said from the heart, sustain prayer when words do not come to you.
Your challenge for this idea
Pray an Our Father slowly today, truly thinking through each phrase, as if saying it for the first time.
BASED ON
The Our Father →