On praying outloud

I found an interesting post on another blog about praying outloud and about prayer being a verbal thingy. It is a good read!

I've been trying out contemplative prayer a bit recently, and frankly it feels weird, so this post was really interesting. I've also been reflecting recently on my Christology. I've realised that I find it easier to "connect with God" (by which I mean have some nice spiritual feelings whilst praying / singing etc) when I have my eyes closed, because I have a sense of concentrating on Jesus more when I do that. But in considering the truly man, truly God nature of Christ recently I think I have been concentrating on Him in His divine, "spirit" form, and forgetting that Jesus is still a man, albeit a resurrected man.

I've been feeling challenged in worship particularly to keep my eyes open and to recognise that God is as much present when I have my eyes open as when they are closed. That might sound weird, but I think I've been seperating the spiritual and the material a bit much, because closing my eyes to block out sensory material information whilst worshipping is to say that the material world is not spiritual! Dang that Greek/gnostic philosophy/heresy creeping into my thinking!! It's almost by closing my eyes I'm creating a 'more spiritual world' under my eyelids where I can retreat from the 'real world' to.

This idea of praying outloud that is suggested in the other post I'm finding interesting as another layer on my spiritual/material question. If I pray silently, it seems more 'spiritual' whereas to pray outloud perhaps more material. But what I'm thinking is if I pray outloud it is acknowledging that the material is spiritual, and it is also a recognition of Christ's humanity. If He was ONLY human I would talk to Him outloud, so why because He is also divine do I retreat into silent prayer unless I'm in a public setting?

God bless,
Bec