Soul Searching is Casper ter Kuile’s new monthly column drawing on ancient wisdom to live a spiritual life in the modern world. Casper is the author of The Power of Ritual, holds master’s degrees in Divinity and Public Policy from Harvard University, and co-founded the podcast Harry Potter and the Sacred Text, and Sacred Design Lab.
For religious friends of mine, prayer seems to open a portal to a world that’s beyond my reach. Like there’s some divine VIP area where you can whisper in God’s ear to plead for what you need. Not exactly a holy vending machine that gives you what you want, but certainly a secret language that can lead to ecstatic mystical union and profound peace.
I’ve tried to trick myself into praying. But I don’t believe in a deity that’s listening to my complaints and desires. And many traditional prayers feel too weighed down by patriarchy for my taste. So getting on my knees for God, or swaying back and forth, let alone prostrating myself — it all feels absurd.
And I’m not alone. A 2020 Gallup survey found that less than half of Americans belong to a church, synagogue, temple, or mosque. And despite recent headlines pointing to religious revival, a 2025 poll from Pew Research Center suggests otherwise: Only 30 percent of young adults born between 1995 and 2002 say they pray every day.
So, it seems, prayer isn’t for me, or for many of us.
Starting in the 1990s, Dr. Herbert Benson led a decade-long study on the efficacy of prayer. He was an esteemed cardiologist and the founder of the Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. His rigorous study confirmed what nonbelievers might have expected: Praying for someone who was sick had no positive impact on their recovery. But during his many years of research, he also found that there was an impact on the person doing the praying.
Even though I didn’t grow up religious, I got a taste of that positive impact as a child. When I was around 10 or 11 years old, I’d often stay over at a friend’s house because I liked him and loved his PlayStation. When it was time for bed, his mother would tuck us in. Standing at the door of his bedroom, she’d turn out the light and say:
And, together, we would respond, “bright!”
It felt good to hear those words before falling asleep. And it felt good, too, saying them out loud, just now, all these years later. So if we know that prayer can improve our psychological well-being, but we don’t believe in God, what can we do?
It starts with telling the truth.
Psychoanalysts Ann and Barry Ulanov describe prayer as “primary speech.” By this, they mean that it is a basic and fundamental way we say who we are, and we do it with total honesty. That might involve expressing longing and love, yes, but also fear, anger, bitterness, and jealousy — the good, the bad, and the ugly of our human experience. Dive into a sacred text like the Psalms of the Hebrew Bible and you will find examples of people berating the divine, confessing that they’ve lost all hope, or even pleading for the death of their enemies. Prayer is unsanitary. It’s messy. It’s real-talk.
The 20th-century Russian Orthodox teacher of prayer Anthony Bloom would agree with this. In his book Beginning to Pray, published more than 50 years ago, he wrote (using religious language, of course), “As long as we are truly ourselves, God can be present and do something with us. But the moment we try to be what we are not, there is nothing left to say or have; we become a fictitious personality, an unreal presence, and this unreal presence cannot be approached by God.”
I’ve found the best way of practicing this kind of honesty without bringing God into it is writing in my journal. Especially in the dark. There’s a level of ugly honesty that can flow from my pen when my eyes can hardly make out the words I’m writing on the page.
But saying those words out loud? That still feels difficult.
So, I considered advice offered by the Rev. Alba Onofrio, a queer, feminist pastor — and someone who isn’t afraid of speaking the truth. She co-founded the Sexual Liberation Collective and her work focuses on eradicating shame and reclaiming sexual pleasure as a way of connecting to the divine. In an episode of her podcast, Onofrio advises those just beginning to pray to start with words they already know.
Is there a song or quote you already know every word of? A piece of text that your mind goes to when you are stressed or scared? Or is there something you’d want to learn?
I’ve found myself reciting poems by Marie Howe and Lucille Clifton as a form of prayer. I go someplace where nobody can hear me, and I say them out loud to get the prayer juices flowing. I’ve tried singing, too.
But this still doesn’t solve the question of who is listening. For that, Onofrio’s advice is simple: “Who do you want to talk to?” Is there someone who’s loved you who has passed away and who you wish was here to listen? A grandparent, a favorite teacher or mentor, even a pet? Onofrio suggests thinking about who you need to hear from. “The point of prayer is just connection…a spiritual digging the mud and silt out of the channel that connects us to the erotic, to God, to creation” she says in her podcast. Perhaps this is why so many religions have saints or lesser deities to pray to; it gives you a phonebook of options to connect with.
Truth be told, I still struggle with this. When the going gets tough, an imaginary person at the other end of my prayers still feels too abstract to be compelling.
Not to worry, the Rev. Micah Bucey tells me. We don’t need someone to be listening to benefit from prayer.
Bucey is the author of the The Book of Tiny Prayer and has been posting his very short prayers on social media since the pandemic began. In an interview, he explained that the only necessary ingredients for his prayers are attention, intention, time, and quiet.
“Every morning, I take a moment to pay attention to my body and then the news,” Bucey told me. “And then, I set an intention for what is mine to do today.” He follows a simple framework to set that intention:
I find that the first step — naming — is really where this version of prayer has its impact. Honoring the hurt I feel, or the anger, the shame or the sadness, is what unlocks something deeper than my everyday thinking can reach.
Do I sometimes wish there was some supreme being that might then make it all okay? Sure, that would be nice. But prayer, for me at least, has been much less about peace and stillness. Prayer is struggle. It’s the discipline of discovering what I really feel. It’s being honest enough to write or say it aloud. And it’s trusting that this practice will help me do what is mine to do in a world with so much pain and suffering.
So, dear reader, will you pray with me?
