The Power of Prayer

The Power of Prayer

By Sharon Blair

My father can’t pray. At least he can’t pray out loud. He’s been praying out loud all his life, in church, in restaurants, and before meals at home. In the home were I grew up, there’s always been a whole lot of praying going on.

Now at ninety, my Southern Baptist father can’t pray. When he tries, he starts sobbing. He says it’s because of Mother.

A few months ago, we had to put Mother in a nursing home. Her mind is gone, from strokes and perhaps Alzheimer’s. Physically, she’s a mess, with several ailments. My father was her primary caregiver — and his own — for years.

Then he started to drop weight. A blood test sent up an alarm. My father has Hodgkin’s Disease, the most advanced kind.

Months of chemotherapy and transfusions have left him feeble but alive. During his first treatment, Mother went over the edge mentally and had to be removed from their home.

Although my father is hanging on to his life for all it’s worth, refusing nursing care, and visiting Mother when he can, this sick and lonely old man can’t pray.

Christianity has been the focus of his life, but he and I never discuss religion, at least mine. He knows that I live my life under a religiously liberal Unitarian-Universalist umbrella, but it’s like the secret that dares not speak its name. Even so, during my Christmas visit, I was the designated pray-er, delivering mildly eccentric blessings before each meal, like…

We hope that Mother is having a good day

today and that when we see her later, it will be

a comforting time for us all. We hope that all

our family and friends feel our love and that

they are safe. We are thankful for this food

and for being together. Amen.

My father seemed grateful for these directionless hopes I tossed out over biscuits and gravy at breakfast and bowls of beans and platters of fried chops and chicken I prepared for his lunch. And I think he was pleased to hear me imploring something, of someone or something somewhere.

And there is something, somewhere. Its powerful presence showed up on Christmas Eve.

I gathered Mother from the nursing home and drove the few miles to the tiny Arkansas town where she’s lived for sixty-six years. We drove within 500 feet of her home. She had no idea where she was. I could have said we were in SoHo, and she likely would have said, “I’ve always liked it here. What about you?”

At my niece’s home for the family dinner, there was a certain bedlam with kids and gifts and getting the buffet served. When my father arrived, he and my mother kissed passionately on the lips.

Mother asked my niece, whose home we were in, “Vicki, do you eat here often?”

We stood around the table, waiting for the blessing. About the time I remembered my father couldn’t pray out loud, I whispered to my sister, “You do it.” Louder than me, Daddy said to Mother, “Marie, you say the blessing.” We bowed our heads, not knowing what to expect, expecting the worst.

An extraordinary thing happened. Like a savant, Mother wove a prayer that would put Billy Graham to shame. This 82-year-old woman, who most often thinks she’s in her fifties, whose sentences often start in one decade and end in another, delivered the most eloquent prayer I’ve ever heard. She started with a powerful, “Dear Lord.” She prayed for her family, those there and away. She talked about the joy of food and sharing it with loved ones. She expressed gratitude for her life, and then, she blessed the power of prayer, describing it as a gift that she hoped we all could share. At the end, she paused dramatically, then said, “In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

My father’s body shook. He put his arm around Mother. The rest of us looked at each other and said, “Amen.”

I filled Mother’s plate. She ate a bite now and then, but mostly moved food from one side of the plate to the other. She said she was tired from cooking. My father helped her sip some iced tea. He cut her a few pieces of ham. She ate a few bites of pie.

As we drove away, she asked if we were going home. I said, “Not today.”

“Where are we going?” she asked. I told her we were going where she should stay until Daddy is well.

She asked if I had seen my brother who died four years ago. I said, “No, not today.”

At the nursing home, she said, “I’ve never been here before in my life. I don’t know anyone here.”

A nurse said, “You know me. I got you fixed up to see your family.”

The old woman who had spent the day of the home’s Christmas party and Living Nativity Scene jumping up and down proclaiming “I’m going to play the baby Jesus! I’m going to play the baby Jesus!” came running down the hall.

Mother said, “That’s the meanest woman that ever lived.”

In her room, Mother asked the nurse, “Are you the one who takes care of me?”

I kissed Mother good-bye. I said I’d see her in a month. She asked, “Am I supposed to stay here?”

When I said, “Yes,” she asked “What am I supposed to do here?” I could only tell her she could read or watch TV, neither of which she could really do.

I fled the room. As I hurried down the hall, past the emergency evacuation plan on the wall that Mother had pointed to earlier, saying “That’s the way to get to Europe,” I could hear her calling, “Sharon. Sharon, come here for a while,” like a prayer. Yes, like a prayer.

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