For Those Who Pray

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 118, 26 September 1941, Page 4

For Those Who Pray

HIS is a secular journal, catering as frankly for those who doubt as for those who believe, and not squeamish about the support of scoffers. The rationalist has exactly the same rights in our columns as the saint, those who live for the day the same rights as those whose minds are fixed on eternity. Our waggon is not hitched to the stars, but lumbers along the dusty road. And yet we have no kind of hesitation in drawing attention to the fact that the Religious Advisory Committee of the National Broadcasting Service has prepared and published a folder called "The Dedicated Minute," the purpose of which is to unite all those who can unite in a minute of silent prayer every day. Nor do we doubt that the number who can and will respond to this appeal is vastly greater than most people imagine. Over the whole English-speaking world it is certainly many millions, but even in New Zealand it is probably a bigger and closer and more earnest host than any call has ever rallied before. However foolish it would be to pretend that listening to Big Ben is prayer, that it is praying to stop talking or working for a moment, or even to stand reverently in a public meeting, it would be many times more foolish to say that prayer is meaningless and useless, and that those who engage in it waste their time. Science has made no difference whatever to the statement that those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. It never can make a difference while people do wait on the Lord. Renewal of strength is the purpose of the silent minute. It is the purpose of this folder, which anyone can buy for a penny. It will not renew the strength of those who do not seek renewal, or of those who can't, but to say that it will not help those who turn that way for help is like saying, if we are deaf, that birds do not sing, or that roses are not red because we ourselves are blind ~~