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By Alma Nelson

Prayer is that attitude of mind where we are "in tune with the Infinite." It is a meditation on things as they are in their eternal aspect, an overwhelming desire to know God. It is the state of mind, where the conditions of this world do not matter to us, for we are lost in the contemplation of things eternal. To pray is to know and to feel that God is, and everything is all right. Can we pray with our lips and on bent knees? Praise the Lord, yes, at least some people can at times, and it is beautiful to have had the privilege of witnessing a prayer of this kind.

But a true prayer does not necessarily have to be expressed in words of worship, nor does it even, according to my belief, have to be connected with religion. The scientist who diligently and earnestly pursues the question, "What is Truth?" is just as surely praying, because in their ultimate sense science and religion are one. When the scientist finds eternal truth, he stands face to face with God, and if there is anything in religion, as we know it today that is not absolutely true, it must fall. God and Truth are one and inseparable. We are all heading for the same goal, but we get there on different roads. Every one must follow the light that he sees, for that is the only one for him to trust.

Prayer is the consciousness in which we know only the good and are open only to the good, where everything that is unlike God for the time being ceases to exist in our minds, as in the world of reality it has never existed. It is the earnest endeavor to be right at all times: a constant striving to think and feel, speak and do, only that which is in harmony with All Good. It is to be steadfast in God in the face of everything that may happen, to know that the real I AM of us now and forever is safe, perfect and eternal. No part of it can ever be lost or harmed; the eternal Being is now radiant, sweet and wholesome. It is "to characterize ourselves with the characteristics of God," as the Bahai leader said. To pray is to feel the conditions of heaven here on earth, to feel power surging through us and yet to be humble, yea, doubly humble; to look through the seeming temporal and behold the eternal beauty.

Prayer is the clearness of mind, where the reflection of God is distinct and beautiful, where the symmetry is perfect, the coloring is exquisite. It is the ability to let go of the aspects of the external world and just to "let there be light," to enter the consciousness where there are no personalities. To pray is to carry out conscientiously every good impulse we receive. It is to lay down on the altar every burden, every sickness, and every human desire, be it ever so dear.

Praise and gratitude are prayer. When it becomes real to our sense that here and now we are spiritual beings, and that in the world that is as yet hidden from our physical eyes we are already in possession of the thing we desire to see manifested, our hearts begin to sing and our lips utter the highest words of praise and prayer, "Father, I thank Thee, that Thou hast heard me and I know that Thou hearest me always."

Prayer is the communication between the individual soul and the universal, merging and anointing of the conscious mind in the Cosmic. The persistent hunger and thirst for righteousness is a prayer, acceptable to the Supreme Being. When we are praying in secret we are not conscious of our bodies or any other external things; there is no pain, no darkness, no burden, only a sweet peace and a healing light that makes free.

Prayer is a sweet sense of completeness, a feeling that the persistent longing for something imperishable is satisfied, a knowing that there is a world more real than the world our physical eyes see and that, in this world, there is peace and joy and life and love, and that this world of perfect understanding and blessedness is our sacred home where we eternally belong.