#8 Just Pray

Just Pray

By no means am I a crazy faithful Catholic boy. Yes, I break the rules, and no, I don't agree with everything my church expects me to believe. However, this doesn't mean that my relationship with god is any different than it would be if I were the perfect member of the Catholic Church.

For a large sum of the past two years I have found my relationship with God to be intensely strained. I would question my beliefs in my church and in God himself almost constantly. I never let myself think that I didn't believe in God but there was definitely room for denial in my day-to-day thoughts.

I would continue to pray every once in a while but when I would pray, I would feel like I was just talking to myself, like God wasn't really there listening to me. That was up until last week.

Last week was probably one of the worst weeks of my life. My aunt attempted suicide and then two days later my sister-in-law miscarried her first conceived child. How I was keeping it together those two days, I don't know. These events were constantly on my mind and just wouldn't seem to let up and give my mind some peace. I would be driving alone after school and ever so slightly fall apart at the idea of not getting to hold what was supposed to be my first niece or nephew, and not knowing why my aunt thought that taking her life was a good idea.

One night while I was in the shower I began to tear up as I thought about that week’s events. I sat down in the shower and let the warm water run over my head and routinely, when I don't know what else to do, began to pray, but this prayer wasn't like the other prayers I had been experiencing. As I sat and prayed to god in my shower I began to sob, not because of the events of that week, but because of the fact that for the first time in a long time, I felt god there with me as I prayed. It felt as if he placed his hand on my back and was telling me that everything was going to work out and things would be okay.

Since that day, I have not completely healed my relationship with God but I definitely got a good start.

Like I said, before that night, praying didn't seem to be anything but me thinking to myself trying to give myself the slightest sliver of hope in a rough situation, but I never stopped praying and I have made it through some pretty rough times just fine.

So there you have it kids, whether praying is your thing or not, even if you just need to think to yourself and give your soul a sense of hope, Just Pray, because in the end, everything will turn out just fine.