Moments of Prayer

The Year 7s are experiencing different styles of prayer. Through the celebration of prayer, sacrament and liturgy, and particularly the Eucharist, Jesus Christ is made present to the Christian community to give them life, to heal them and to form them as a people. Christians can discover and express most clearly who they are and who they are called to be as they enter into these celebrations.

The unit begins by considering what prayer is and why we pray. Prayer is bigger and more varied than we imagine. While almost impossible to define, it is about keeping company with God; speaking to God and listening to God. When we pray we attempt to reach into the deeper dimension of our lives – our spirituality, our relationships with each other and with God. Through prayer we acknowledge, contemplate, listen to, thank, respond to, communicate with, search for, become reconciled with and relate to God. 

Now that students have returned from remote learning they will have the opportunity to experience different prayer forms. Prayer comes in a huge variety of styles and forms from the traditional to the modern and spontaneous. Some styles appeal to some people, others do not. In this way, prayer may be likened to music – individual taste and preference mean we may feel more comfortable with some styles and not others. Being conscious of our own sense of ease with some prayer styles reminds us that prayer is an intimate act. To invite someone to pray is to invite them to search and explore a perhaps less well known side of themselves. This may make us, and them, feel vulnerable.

A recent prayer experience was a Visio Divina. Visio Divina is a form of divine seeing in which we prayerfully invite God to speak to our hearts as we look at an image. Visio Divina is a form of divine seeing in which we prayerfully invite God to speak to our hearts as we look at an image. This Mosaic of each Year 7 student incorporated into the face of God was the first image that the Year 7s explored in their Visio Divina. Students reflected on how they as a community are the living presence of Jesus, and they reflected what is truly divine within themselves.