“OK, now it says we need to light a candle and pray together — but not an Our Father or something. We have to ‘pray from the heart’ in our own words.’ Uh…how about you start? …”
It felt very foreign to speak out loud to the Lord with my fiancé. I was fairly used to praying out loud spontaneously in a group setting, but that was a more general type of prayer. “Thank you for the beautiful day, Jesus, and for gathering us here together. Etc.”
This was different. It required a vulnerability and intimacy that felt uncomfortable and took me by surprise. We stumbled through it that first time, uncertain and self-conscious.
Time and practice
We might not have continued praying out loud together, but it was a requirement of our marriage preparation program. So we continued week by week to pray, sharing our intentions, our fears, and hopes with the Lord and each other.
It got easier and felt more natural to pray as time went on.
Then the program ended and we got married. We returned to couple prayer occasionally, knowing it was good to pray together. Often in times of stress or difficulty one of us would suggest it. Praying aloud together happened in fits and bursts for years until recently, when we joined a marriage group that asks its members to pray together daily.
Why pray as a couple?
Making the jump from praying only when things are bad or hard to praying regularly is powerful, and often the habit’s fruits are obvious quickly. As we have gotten back into the habit of “praying out loud together from the heart,” I am amazed at how much understanding and unity can grow between us from something so simple.
Hearing the person I love and live side-by-side with articulate his struggles and hopes, and how he wants Jesus to heal and help different situations or relationships, gives me a whole new perspective into him. Even during this season of life where I have felt that we are particularly close and on the same page, it gives me a window into who he is that continually surprises me.
This window allows me to see him more clearly and compassionately.
The practicalities of couple prayer
Finding the time to pray together can be challenging. We continually make the discovery that with small children, what works one month as far as routines go might not work the next. At the moment, in the evenings after the last kid is in bed is the best time for us. I’m sure mornings will work better at a different point in life for us, as we are both more naturally morning people. But right now someone small is sure to be up in the morning when we are up, so evening it is.
What it looks like for us is that we spend some time in separate silent prayer in the same room and then end by praying out loud together. We each take a minute to voice what is on our hearts — be that gratitude for specific things in our life or heaviness from the day, and appreciation for the good we have seen in each other. Then we pray the Magnificat together and call it a night.
I’m glad we kept going and didn’t stop after the newness and discomfort of practicing this kind of prayer early on during our engagement. It has only gotten easier and more natural, especially after we recommitted to it daily.
Come, Holy Spirit, teach us how to pray.
