Washington National Cathedral

The Sunday Forum: Critical Issues in the Light of Faith

Cathedral Dean Samuel T. Lloyd shares his views about prayer in this special Sunday Forum.

Why is prayer easier, stranger, and more rewarding than you might think—instead of being harder, more pedantic and boring, and less rewarding than you could ever imagine? Lloyd offers a new take on the subject.

The dean shares memories of his efforts to pray during high school and college, and his sense that he was talking with himself: “How could I connect with God?” Only after enrolling in seminary did Lloyd begin to discover more about prayer. “The spiritual life is not about my trying to connect with God,” he learned, “but God trying to connect with me.” The Bible is not about the human quest for God, but about God’s quest for us: creating, forming, and teaching. (C. S. Lewis, in Surprised by Joy, even compares the quest for God with a mouse searching for a cat, while the cat has been stalking the mouse all along.)

Prayer, then, is about paying attention as God comes toward us. “Lord, you have searched me out and known me,” writes the psalmist. In the words of an anonymous hymn,

I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew,
he moved my soul to seek him, seeking me;
it was not I that found, O Savior true;
no, I was found, was found of thee.

At the heart of all of our lives is immense yearning for more. Restlessness, a desire for fullness, remains with humans throughout life. Nevertheless, it is famously hard for many people to maintaining a prayer routine, perhaps because of what Thomas Merton called a true self and a false self.

The false self is characterized by our daily concerns; the true, integrated self allows us to listen to God, who seeks us out and speaks to us and through us. The true self, held close by God, is deeper than we can imagine.

If we want to pray, how can we get started? Although we need to find out what works for each of us—a time, a place, an approach—Lloyd suggests first sitting quietly and comfortably for five or ten minutes, until the clutter of the mind starts to subside. At that more peaceful moment, read a passage of Scripture. Repeat the passage, turn it into prayer, and linger. Bring to God the events of the past day or week. Listen for God’s voice. Express concerns honestly, offering God anger and worry if that is what you feel. And praise God, adore God, and indeed ask God to act. Overall, Lloyd advises, “Pray as you can, not as you can’t.”

About The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III

The Rev. Dr. Samuel T. Lloyd III was installed as the ninth dean of Washington National Cathedral on April 23, 2005, charged with leadership of what is widely referred to as “the national house of prayer.” His final Sunday as dean was September 18, 2011.

Dean Lloyd previously served as rector of historic Trinity Church, Copley Square in Boston, Massachusetts, for 12 years. His work in Boston focused on preaching, teaching, and developing Christian community, with emphases on lay leadership, wide-ranging styles of worship, and engagement in a broad array of direct and social justice ministries.

Dean Lloyd began his ministry as an assistant professor of religious studies at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville in the early 1980s while also serving as assistant to the rector and chaplain at St. Paul’s Memorial Church in Charlottesville. In 1984 he became rector of the Church of St. Paul and the Redeemer in Chicago, Illinois. Prior to moving to Boston, Dean Lloyd was chaplain of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee.

Dean Lloyd holds a Masters of Divinity degree from Virginia Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Virginia. He also holds an M.A. degree in English Literature from Georgetown University and received his B.A. from the University of Mississippi. He has received honorary Doctor of Divinity degrees from the University of the South and Virginia Theological Seminary.

Dean Lloyd has taught in seminaries and has frequently spoken at conferences and conventions. He has preached on the “Protestant Hour” on radio and offered courses in the area of Christianity and literature, including Flannery O’Connor, Dante, contemporary fiction, C. S. Lewis, and the parables.

He currently serves as a regent of the University of the South. His writing and reviews have been published by the Sewanee Theological Review, Forward Movement, Anglican Digest, and Journal of Religion, among others.