I recently had a conversation with someone that I hadn't seen in a while - a long while - and, quite frankly, I was unpleasantly surprised with his fatalism. He was incredibly well versed in every social evil that has ever happened, ever, in the history of forever. As the conversation went on, I challenged him with a question that my father and his straightforward, engineering-styled mindset introduced me to and that my Jesuit education reinforced and brought to the forefront: "What do you propose?" In other words, "What exactly do you plan on doing about it?"
If I was disappointed by his choice in conversational topic, I was even more disappointed my his answer: he gave me a long, drawn-out, convoluted answer that essentially added up to "I haven't the foggiest idea." He ended his monologue by saying, "We, of course, should pray for the situation."
Argle.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the power of prayer. I'm a believing, practicing Catholic, and throughout my life, I have seen firsthand the power that prayer holds. The thing is, I've seen the power of prayer enough to know that it itself does nothing for a situation. Now, before you get all riled and accuse me of being a false believer (parenthetically, I don't believe in judging what another person holds in their heart, but I suppose that's between you and God), let me explain what I mean here.
The great Catholic theologian and beloved children's author C.S. Lewis once said that prayer "doesn't change God - it changes me." From what I've seen, this is exactly the case. A person prays about a situation, and God grants them the tools they need to do something about the situation. God, however, does not fix the situation from on high. God fixes the situation by putting you here and giving you the tools you need to do something.
While I appreciate prayer, and pray regularly, and would never criticize a person for praying, I will say that thinking that prayer will change the situation - and not the self - is detrimental to both the individual and to larger society. Praying that better vaccinations come along isn't going to make better vaccinations come along; it's going to give us the gumption we need to lobby medical research labs to do the work to find a better vaccination. Praying isn't going to stop the drug trade; it's going to give us the nerve to fight back against a force that's working to hurt our children and our families.
Once we understand that prayer drives us to do, we can see why the fatalism that my conversation partner displayed was, to be frank, completely uncalled for. He literally predicted the fall of society - the entire world society, not just American society - as a result of the failure of the family. My question: Has the family failed? Yes, I understand that there are bad and even terrible family situations. Yes, I understand that government has a long way to go before we get to the point of being able to care for the people who need it most. Yes, I understand that children are in high security prisons because they didn't have a parental figure there to sit them down and tell them 'No.' I understand all of this. I am not an ostrich, burying my head in the sand.
However, I also see people - young people - who have happy marriages, happy children, and happy homes. I know more than one couple where a child was born out of wedlock and someone else stepped in and willingly became a parental figure to a child that was not their own. I see couples who are bending over backwards and giving everything they have to save a marriage that has become strained. Most of all, I see all of this happening under the ever-present and judging eye of people who say that the nuclear family has failed. Most of these couples that I see are from my own Catholic community - so I have to believe they pray. Knowing that these people pray and that God didn't rain down happiness sprinkles on them serves, I think, to prove my point: through prayer, God gives us the power to do something, but only if we aren't so fatalistic that we give up on the whole venture.
My third and last point is this: I think prayer is by nature an optimistic practice. I do not believe that a person with no hope for anything prays. I do not believe that hopelessness leads to prayer. I do not think that a person can simultaneously believe that society is going to hell in a handbasket (which should have happened repeatedly by now, if fatalists were correct) and pray that things get better.
I think that prayer is the action of hope, and that through hoping for change and praying for the strength to achieve it, that change is, in fact, realized.
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