Dear Tim:

One of the strategies of the devil is to encourage us to busy ourselves, even in prayer, to the point that we burn out or neglect other things. God expects us to be good stewards of our time. That means balance.

You are not a cloistered monk and thus you are not expected to spend hours and hours in prayer. You need to balance your life. If you exercise to the point of collapse what have you gained? Balance in all things.

Even for an abbot in a monastery this issue of prayer vrs. the administrative, executive, and pastoral duties that cause the abbot to not be able to pray as much as he would like. St. Alphonsus Ligouri once said to abbots that God knows the responsibilities they have; he put them in that position of responsibility. God knows the struggle between those responsibilities and the desire for more prayer. But, if you prayer for only 15 minutes God will give you the grace as if you had prayed for hours. But, do not tell God that you cannot pray for 15 minutes.

This advice applies to all of us. God knows the responsibilities you have. He does not expect you to pray to the point of neglecting those responsibilities. Yet the Bible tells us to always be in prayer. What does that mean?

Saints like St. Therese, the Little Flower, and others teach us that all things should be prayer. For example, the act of picking up a pencil off the floor can be a prayer.  Changing a dirty diaper can be a prayer. Taking a shower can be a prayer. Your employment can be a prayer.

In this sense, these things are prayer because we live in a demeanor of prayer, an attitude of prayer, a desire to offer up all our experiences to God without saying a word.

These daily activities can also be an opportunity for specific verbal prayer. For example, while changing a dirty diaper one can pray, "Lord, as I change this dirty diaper please cleanse the dirt from my soul." Or in taking a shower, "Lord, as I wash the filth from my body, cleanse the filth from my soul." In picking up a pencil, "Lord, as I pick up this pencil pick me up under your eagle's wings." As we sit in a traffic jam, "Lord, let this traffic jam teach me patience."

If we get into a mindset of prayer we can find hundreds of opportunities for one-liner prayers like that I exampled.

Prayer is not always talking. In fact, we need to shut up sometimes. With all our verbal prayers God can't get a word in edgewise. The Bible tells us to "Be still and know that I am God."

As for dealing with a growing prayer list, there are two ways to handle that (or combine the two):

1) Keep a prayer log containing all the prayer intentions you have. Then pray specifically for the person or situation for the first day or two. After that there is no need to prayer specifically but just include at the end of your prayer, "... and for all other intentions in my prayer log." God knows what is on the list.

2) Organize your prayer time. On Monday's pray for family; Tuesday's pray for friends; Wednesday's pray for the nation; Thursday's pray for.....

Break down your intentions into categories like this and specialize your prayer to those categories on the given day. Even then the intentions may get to be too many. That is when you also do #1.

Daily reception of the Eucharist, one hour per week in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, and a maximum of 30 minutes or so (certainly not more than one hour but only if that does not interfere with the relationship with spouse and family or work) of specific prayer in the morning and in the evening are sufficient. At other times be in that mindset of prayer as you go about your day.

Remember, you are not a monk. I know a man who prayed so much that he neglected his family. He ended up divorced. His wife said, "I did not expect to be married to St. Francis".

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary