Prayers on deaf ears

Recently a close friend of mine was experiencing a matter of life and death. The suddenness by which it appeared to her and her family was only equaled by its potential for utter heartbreak. However a strange side effect happened to me that I wasn’t expecting. Someone came to me and asked that I pray for her about this situation, and since they know that I’ve been going to church weekly, they asked that I tell other people and ask them to pray about it too. It was a very dire request, and it took me off guard. This person said, very sincerely, to please ask as many people as I could to pray for our friend and her family. Which got me thinking very hard about prayer. And needless to say, I’m confused.

It’s been told to me many times that God has a plan for all of us, for the earth, for the entire universe. If this is true, then we are silly indeed if we think we can change this plan – or even more audaciously, if we think we can ask God to change his plan for us measly humans. And to me, every time I hear someone praying for something, they’re asking for something they want to happen. It’s not necessarily a selfish request; in this case, people were praying for my friend and her family to avoid deathly catastrophe. But every time, a prayer is us asking God, “Please, let this happen.” Now correct me if I’m wrong, but God already knows whether he’s going to allow someone to die or not, since we’re all living out his plan, right? So us asking him is rather futile, because whatever’s written in his plan is going to happen, no matter what. If the person lives, God didn’t really answer anybody’s prayer, because he already planned on letting that person live. And if the person dies, God didn’t ignore anyone’s prayer, because he planned on killing that person anyway. It’s almost like the prayer falls on deaf ears, because why should God care what we want, he’s the big boss with the all-knowing reasons behind everything, why on earth should he change his grand plan just because we ask him to?

And it also seems to be the belief among all peoples of faith that the sheer number of people praying for one specific thing will effect how God will answer. I think it’s already apparent that God’s going to follow his plan no matter what. So whether it’s one person or 10 million, if God wants that person to kick the bucket, there ain’t nothing we can do about it. If all 7 billion humans on earth prayed every day for 10 years for an amputee to suddenly sprout a new leg on their own, it would still never happen. And that’s a lot of prayer power right there.

If a person dies, people quickly forget that God completely ignored their earnest requests for keeping this person alive and healthy, because they immediately start praying for God to provide comfort to them and their family. When again, God already knows whether or not that’s going to happen. OR… if this person lives, people walk around wide-eyed and reverent, claiming that it was a miracle and a sign of God’s faith. God didn’t do anything different than what he already had planned, we’re just the ones going up in arms about it either way, as if we actually had something to do with it. We’re so freakin’ melodramatic.

What I’ve also been told is that God wants us to pray, because he wants us to attempt the communication with him. To keep up the personal relationship. If we were to hear God’s side of the conversation, it might be kind of heartbreakingly ironic: “Aww shucks guys, I really appreciate the communication. I still let them die anyway, but thanks for the effort!” That’s the cue for Buddy Christ to appear and give us all the thumbs up.

People's explanation for what prayer is seems to change to fit the situation. God answered your prayer because God is faithful and he answers prayers. Or he didn't answer your prayer because there must be a lesson you're supposed to learn. It's all part of God's grand plan, but let's ask for something else we want and hope God answers because he is faithful and he answers prayers. It seems strangely circular. And futile. And I don’t get it.

Will blog for food

I’m a little torn on how I feel toward homeless people. Everyone’s seen them standing at the freeway offramp, or at a stoplight on the center median, holding the stereotypical cardboard sign with some phrase describing their hardship written in a sharpie (one question always comes to mind: where did they get the sharpie?). Some are old, some surprisingly young, some have their pets with them, some have their children, some are Vietnam vets, others recently lost their jobs. However, despite their apparently destitute situation, I’m always hesitant to hand out money or sympathy whenever I see such a person.

I currently work two careers to make my living and to fuel my ambitions for a prosperous life. I’m at a desk for 50 hours a week doing commercial graphic design, and for my fine art career I probably spend another 30 hours at home painting or hustling at art events. I’m constantly up into the wee hours of the night to get my artwork done, when many times I’d much rather just go to bed. But I do what I must to progress my career(s) forward. Hell even when I was a kid, my dad and I used to collect aluminum cans in alleys, take them to the recycling center, and he'd let my brother and I have all the money that we earned. So I can’t help but feel a little resentful when I’m driving home after just having spent 10 hours in an office earning a living, and I see a perfectly healthy looking man standing on the street corner with his cardboard sign, holding his hand out. I can understand if someone has just lost their job and are having a hard time, but I know for a fact that there are a multitude of programs out there to help people off the street. Shelters where they provide you with food, clean clothes, an address so you can apply for jobs. Or if they have the drive, they can start their own career working for themselves – just as I’ve done with my fine art career. I can’t help but feel many homeless people are there because they either choose to be there, or don't fully understand how to be anywhere else.

I made this silly little chart showing what I think are different categories of one's acknowledgment of their poor situation, as well as their understanding/desire for how to get out of it.


I bring up the homeless issue on this blog because it’s always the poor and misfortunate that are the supposed to be the recipients of our charity in many religions. And I’m all for helping people on hard times get back on their feet again. Soup kitchens, unemployment programs, food stamps, shelters – to help them in their time of destitution to get back on THEIR feet. Not to sustain them indefinitely. I feel the same thing is being done when I reach into my pocket and hand someone my spare change. I’m perpetuating their lifestyle of pan-handling. I’ve seen too many immigrants come over to this country with the shirt on their back – not even speaking our language – who work their asses off and prosper very nicely. So I know it can be done.

Though I guess there may be certain incentives to a homeless lifestyle. Standing at a busy intersection all day, being passed by 20 cars a minute for 10 hours – that could be 12,000 cars. And if only 1% of them stop and give that guy $1, that guy just made $120 cash. The tax-paid equivalent of that could be $144. And he just stood there, looking unhappy. Some people sweat all day with a hammer in their hand or pushing groceries across a barcode scanner and don’t make that much. This is not to say I think at all that being homeless is an easy, lucrative lifestyle. I can only imagine the extent of disease, drugs, and prostitution that are part of that way of life. But you'd think that would be even more of an incentive to climb out.

I do feel that many sidewalk wanderers are not mentally stable. And perhaps this is what prevents them from having the drive to move out of their situation. Perhaps the sane ones in the shelters trying to clean up and get their life back together actually DO, so we don’t seem them anymore. In college I helped a friend of mine film a documentary in LA on homeless people, and we interviewed several people on the street, and then several more in a shelter. And my sentiments were pretty much dead on. The grungy people living by the dumpster at 7-11 made me feel like I was talking to a cross between Jim Carrey and Hannibal Lector, and many people in the homeless shelter were folks who had lost their jobs and their homes and were earnestly trying to get back on top of their life. But there are also great numbers of people who don't know any other way of life, so their pit of despair is invisible to them.

So all in all, I agree with what many religions say about helping the needy and the poor. And I think helping the wretched souls of the world doesn’t need to hinge on any religion, just the desire to extend a hand to those who need it. However I’m all about teaching people to fish so that if they choose, they can realize their own ocean of potential – rather than handing them anchovies the rest of their life.