The recent August school shooting during a Catholic Mass in Minneapolis prompted public arguments about the efficacy of prayer.

For example, former Biden Press Secretary Jen Psaki and current Trump Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt exchanged some heated remarks on prayers offered up for the victims of the shooting. “Prayer is not freaking enough,” Psaki tweeted. “Enough with the thoughts and prayers.”

“It is utterly disrespectful to deride the power of prayer in this country, and it is disrespectful to the millions of Americans of faith,” Leavitt replied. “And I would encourage Ms. Psaki to pray for these families themselves, who need it right now more than ever.”

Psaki, a Democrat, wants action rather than prayers, probably a ban on “assault rifles,” the left’s usual demand in the wake of a mass shooting. This solution is flawed by available data. In 2023, for instance, handguns were used in over 7,000 murders. Rifles accounted for less than 600 killings. Moreover, to propose taking away millions of firearms from law-abiding citizens in the wake of a shooting committed by a deranged and spiritually disturbed 23-year-old man is like punishing an entire school for the infractions of one student.

But the murders of two adolescent students and the wounding of another 21 children and adults also turned a spotlight on the efficacy of prayer. Callous as they were, Psaki’s remarks about prayer brought to mind some people who, one suspects, say “I’ll pray for you,” and then forget all about it. Such promises, so easily given but quickly forgotten, can diminish the value of prayer in the eyes of others.

On the other hand, many Christians I know do pray fervently for others and for themselves, invoking a higher power for reasons ranging from praise and gratitude to a desperate cry for help, and usually offering up these petitions in the silence of their own hearts.

A part of this misunderstanding about prayer is that non-believers and even those lukewarm in their faith see this act of worship and petition as a monologue with no one on the other side of the table. What they fail to understand is that such a conversation with God is never one-sided, not if the supplicants believe their words are being heard. Here an analogy might be made with a close friend who knows how to keep quiet and listen to our troubles. By speaking with that attentive person who lets us do most of the talking, we quite often find that healing and solutions may come from inside of ourselves. Therapists around the country are make a living doing this very thing.

This same scenario is at work in prayer, but with this difference. To their conversations with God, believers generally come equipped with the moral tenets of faith. In prayer they understand those guidelines of morality, operate within them, and often rise and reenter the world equipped with the courage to do the right thing.

The rot in much of American culture today stems not from too many prayers, but from too few, especially for a culture desperately in need of moral ballast. The bullets that killed and wounded those children in Minneapolis came from the gun of a man whose soul and mind were eaten up by darkness and evil, a condition tolerated and by some, even encouraged, in our culture.

From 1952 to 1957, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen hosted the television show “Life Is Worth Living.” Unlikely as it may seem to us today, the show was an enormous hit, drawing millions of viewers weekly, and Sheen won an Emmy for “Most Outstanding Personality.”

In an excellent online sketch of Sheen, Danusha Goska mentions a screen appearance during World War II:

Sheen kept a daily ‘holy hour,’ during which he meditated on the Blessed Sacrament. In one video when America was confronting the Axis Powers, Sheen invites others to observe their own ‘holy hour.’ ‘Think of the great spiritual transformation that there would be in America if every Jew, Protestant, and Catholic, according to the light of his conscience, prayed one continuous hour a day, for the president, for the Congress, and for victory.’

If more of us prayed that our fellow Americans might grow in mental, physical, and moral health, odds are we’d do the same, and America would indeed be transformed.

And at this point, so far removed from Sheen’s time, even five minutes a day spent by Americans in prayer for our country might bring about that “spiritual transformation.”

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The republication of this article is made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal. 

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