Primary Speech: A Psychology of Prayer

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Review: Barry and Anna Ullanov's Primary Speech is a worthy addition to our understanding and much needed concrete experiences of prayer. It is a book about prayer but quickly brings the reader to identify with the struggle that prayer sometimes is. Once people begin to pray prayer quickly goes on the fast track, so to speak, of the known and unknown within us. Psychologically and spiritually speaking prayer does dwell in "primary speech." I was encouraged by this book because it confirmed and enlightened my own experience of prayer at a time when prayer is difficult and bewildering.

Primary Speech brings the reader and practitioner in prayer to some of the most essential elements of the prayer journey: accepting oneself, the courage to go deeper in prayer, not losing hope and becoming competent in exploring the unknown. The book does not get bogged down in jargon but goes directly to why prayer is natural to us and psychologically essential.

Perhaps we read a book when we most need it, never the less, this book speaks to the heart of the matter of prayer when you are most ready to listen.

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Summary: On bringing anything & everything into prayer
Review: Your anger at God, your fear that there is no God, your suspicion that prayer is just a bunch of superstitious nonsense--bring it all into prayer. With chapters like "Prayer and Aggression" and "Sexuality and Prayer," this book gives you permission and encouragement to be completely honest in prayer, to freely and fully express all that is on your mind and in your heart. The approach is psychological, but without _reducing_ prayer to psychology.

(If, like me, you have serious doubts that this world full of suffering has a God worth praying to, I also highly recommend Karl Rahner's "The Need and the Blessing of Prayer.")