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A good
friend of mine recently got some worrisome health news about one of her
children. I sent her a couple of notes to make sure she knew I was concerned
and wanted to help—via text, email, and in response to a Facebook posting.
After sending the last of these, I realized that I had more than once extended
to her my “thoughts and prayers.”
I winced.
The phrase
“thoughts and prayers” has perhaps always had something of the Hallmark
greeting card about it. It certainly doesn’t convey anything creative or
original or highly personal. Still, I think many of us resort to it because we
don’t know what else to say. I can’t provide medical advice or
assistance to my friend’s child, but I can at least let the family know that I
understand their concerns and am throwing my moral support their way.
I have had
the good fortune to be on the receiving end of the thoughts and prayers of
others, and I know that—at least for me—it matters. When, a few years ago, Lisa
and I went through multiple losses over the course of eighteen months we
received many expressions of thoughts and prayers. Neither of us ever turned to
the other and said: “Thoughts and prayers? Is that all they’ve got?!”
Recently,
however, the phrase “thoughts and prayers” has become the target of cynicism, sarcasm,
and ridicule.
I understand
why.
Our public
discourse around gun violence has fallen into an unsettlingly predictable
pattern. Another tragic shooting at a school occurs. Dozens are injured or
killed. Public officials issue statements sending their “thoughts and prayers”
to the victims, family, and friends. And then nothing meaningful gets done to prevent
the next shooting. All we get is more apparently vapid talk about thoughts and
prayers.
As a result,
the sentiment of sending thoughts and prayers has degraded into a bad joke. One
image that circulated around the Internet after the horrific shooting at the
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shows a garbage truck disgorging a load at
a dump. The words “thoughts and prayers” appear on the side of the truck.
The dismissiveness
toward the phrase, which began as a simmer, has heated to a full rolling boil. “I
don’t give a damn about your thoughts and prayers,” musician Will Hoge wrote in
a song. “It’s just wasted words and nobody cares.”
In general,
the criticism of the phrase rests on the notion that we must choose either (a) to
think and pray or (b) to take action. We need the latter, not the former, the
argument goes. One cartoon published after a school shooting shows a control
board filled with buttons and levers. All bear the label “do something” except
for one marked “thoughts and prayers”—the only one being pushed.
As I say, I
understand why the phrase has resulted in expressions of frustration and even
disgust. In some contexts, it sets my own eyes on a furious roll. But I want to
suggest that the devaluation of the phrase can lead us into some deep
confusions and might even lure us into abandoning ideas that have continuing
value and importance.
Let’s start
here. It is certainly true that thinking and praying are inadequate responses
to many things—like gun violence. That they are inadequate responses, however, does not support the conclusion that
they are necessarily meaningless responses.
Many meaningful responses to challenges are, by their nature, partial and
incomplete.
Indeed, this
holds true for “doing something” as well. All of the “somethings” that have
been proposed to address gun violence (and that have any reasonable likelihood
of political success) are partial and incomplete answers to a vast and daunting
question. For example, better coordination of public record databases may be a
good and workable “something” to pursue in response to these tragedies, but no
sensible person would argue that it is adequate.
Furthermore,
thinking deeply about the right strategies to address a problem of this
complexity seems to me indispensable. We lawyers often talk about a factor in
the achievement of a result as being “necessary but not sufficient.” Thinking
about gun violence has certainly proven itself insufficient; but it remains
necessary. Indeed, I fear that our inaction with respect to gun violence has
been partially enabled by our willingness to stop thinking about it—to let it fade from the front of our
consciousness as it fades from the headlines in the news.
In my
theology, praying about difficult problems—and for people, particularly those
who are suffering—is no less necessary. Perhaps this is because I view prayer
as less of a petitionary activity than as an opportunity to be quiet long
enough to hear what God wants us to understand—and to do. I do not see prayer as an alternative
or obstacle to action, but as an
essential predicate to right and
committed action.
The gospels
convey this message over and over. A follower asks John the Baptist or Jesus or
Paul what they should believe, and
the answer takes them through belief to
a point of concrete behavior. Jesus
wants us to keep the poor in our thoughts and to pray for them, precisely
because doing so will prompt us to feed them.
The problem
with the current hostility toward “thoughts and prayers” is that it reduces
these activities to emptiness. One meme that made its way around the Internet
declares “Excellent news! The first truckload of your thoughts and prayers has
just arrived!” It shows the open cargo doors of a giant semi that
contains—nothing.
Granted, we
might accuse someone of acting in bad faith when offering thoughts and prayers.
But that accusation does not depend on some qualitative deficiency inherent in
thinking and praying. Rather, it depends on the sincerity of the person
expressing the sentiment.
To return to
Will Hoge’s tough lyrics, the word doing the most work there is your—I don’t give a damn about your thoughts and prayers. Why not?
Because I don’t think you mean it and I doubt that you’re actually doing either
of them.
In contrast,
when I send my friend my thoughts and prayers she knows that it comes from the
heart.
Or does she?
And does it?
I think the
current controversy over “thoughts and prayers” gives us an excellent occasion
to ask some hard questions of ourselves.
The first is
this: Are we really going to do any thinking or praying about this? If not, then
we’re no better than the target of Will Hoge’s song. We have, ourselves,
reduced the sacred acts of thinking and praying to emptiness; we have drained
them of all moral content; we have—in the guise of compassion—broken a
commitment; we have lied. Ouch.
And the
second question is this: Is there actually something beyond thoughts and prayers that we can offer? Maybe so. But, if
so, in all likelihood it will occur to us only if we actually engage in the
thinking and praying that we said we
were going to do.
So, back to
my story. I sent my friend my thoughts and prayers. Then I winced. Then,
astonishingly, I actually thought and prayed. And, lo and behold, I saw an opportunity
to throw a small sign of grace her way, an additional material show of support
and concern that I know she will appreciate. It turned out not to be at all difficult.
I just needed to keep the promise I had made to her. I needed to not lie.
I think it
would be a terrible shame if we stopped sharing expressions of “thoughts and
prayers.” But maybe we need to give those expressions a better workout and put
some muscle on them. Perhaps we should start saying: “I will keep you in my
thoughts and prayers. And I mean it. Just watch—I’ll show you.”
The current
controversy over “thoughts and prayers” urges us to hold ourselves accountable
in our expressions of concern.
I think that’s
all for the good.
It’s what truly
thoughtful and prayerful people do.
