‘Click to pray’ may sound like a step too far along the technological pathway for some. But just as so many find great comfort in being able to share in the Mass online – and now we are relying on Facebook live streaming and Youtube once more – Pope Francis’ Worldwide Prayer Network offers spiritual encouragement where and when we need it.
I’ve always found it very moving to think of the millions of people around the world praying together. Now we do that with the help of technology, not just in our own private thoughts. Clicking to pray Pope Francis’ intention for January earlier this month (https://clicktopray.org/ ), I saw that over 9,500 people had already shared the reflection that day, and prayed for human fraternity – ‘May the Lord give us the grace to live in full fellowship with our brothers and sisters of other religions, praying for one another, open to all.’
In the previous 30 days, 787,653 prayers had been added to the website. There are links to social media, and there’s an app – as well as a hold-in-your-hand, good old-fashioned booklet that you can keep at your bedside or wherever your ‘prayer space’ might be.
Since last March, isolation has been a problem for so many of us. The need for someone to turn to prompted Frances Gallagher, Justice and Peace Scotland’s communications guru, to post links and phone numbers on social media and our website to help when we’re feeling low. We really need that sort of lifeline – and my own ‘must have’ is the link to the worldwide prayer network that Pope Francis set up in 2020.
I’ve found that some of my molehills have become mountains over the past months, simply because I can’t share with others. Before Lockdown One, our parish had a prayer group, and bringing our personal and societal concerns to the group, articulating with others and with God our hopes and fears, brought spiritual comfort. Some of the issues that our Justice and Peace group went on to tackle began with shared prayers in the prayer group.
I know that if we had been meeting in our prayer group when things went haywire in the United States, our prayers would have reached out to all concerned. I needed an alternative and went to the ‘Pray with the Network’ page on the Click to Pray website. There, someone had posted this prayer, shared on social media: ‘Lord, Please stay close to all the angry people who stormed the US Capitol, to all the leaders who encourage them and to those who condemn them. Help our country to see its dark sides and to work toward reconciliation. Amen’.
What a forgiving prayer, obviously from someone in the United States, and what a comfort and guide to those of us watching the confusing news unfolding from that country.
In what looks like being a longer lockdown than we thought, I know such shared prayers will help me – maybe you could also give it a click!