NOVEMBER 21
True prayer brings us to the edge of a great mystery where
we become inarticulate, where our knowledge fails.
—PARKER PALMERWe would like so much to know. Is my loved one in some
state of gloriously enhanced being? What is it like? Is he or
she aware of me? Shall we know each other again?
If I pray, will I know? But the sustaining power of prayer
is not to be found in unanswerable questions.
A few years ago my husband and I went to Alaska. One
of the highlights of the tour was a bus ride to Denali (Mount
McKinley). We’d heard about its towering majesty all our
lives. We were told it was unlikely we’d be able to see it—the
sky was apt to be clouded, visibility low.
After several hours the bus turned around the base of a
hill. We saw a line of spectators, shoulder to shoulder, gazing
across the Alaskan terrain. There was the mountain, miles
away—gigantic, white—looming into the sky.
We joined the other spectators—probably a hundred
people. There was little conversation. We all gazed at the
mountain. And nothing—no words, no pictures in a travel
brochure, no statistics—could have prepared us. We were
silent.
In the mystery of prayer—I just have to be there.