The neighbors probably didn’t know what to think as they looked out their windows at me one wintry day. I was standing in the driveway with a garden shovel clutched in my hands, whacking wildly and angrily at a clump of ice that had formed beneath a corner gutter. With each smack, I was uttering prayers that were variations on one theme: “I can’t do this.” “You can’t expect me to do this.” “I don’t have the strength to do this.” As a caregiver, with a long list of responsibilities to handle, I now had this ice to deal with, and I had had enough!
My anger was wrapped around a bundle of lies: “I deserve better than this.” “God isn’t enough after all.” “Nobody cares anyway.” But when we choose to cling to our anger, we become mired in the trap of bitterness, never moving forward. And the only cure for anger is truth.
The truth is that God does not give us what we deserve; He gives us mercy instead. “You, Lord, are forgiving and good, abounding in love to all who call to you” (Ps. 86:5). The truth is that God is more than enough, despite what we see. The truth is that His strength is sufficient (2 Cor. 12:9). Yet before we can find such reassurance, we may need to step back, lay down the shovel of our own efforts, and take Jesus’ hand that’s extended to us in mercy and grace.
God is big enough to listen to our anger and loving enough to show us, in His time, the path forward.
Loving God, forgive me for my outbursts of anger. Today I choose to lay down my sinful anger and accept Your mercy and grace. Thank You for forgiveness and for truth that leads to wisdom.
Shelly Beach is the author of several books, including Precious Lord, Take My Hand: Meditations for Caregivers.
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Angry Prayers
Brendan Busse, SJ
Everybody hurts. When I don’t have words to articulate my pain or frustration, I get crude. But crude is probably better than repressed. So I let ‘em rip: Damn it. Damn. Damn. Damn it.
This is my psalm of lament: “God, damn it” (Psalms of Brendan – Book 1, verse 1).
Is it too much? Or is it prayer?
There are too many moments when the depravity of our human family appalls for it not to be. There are too many moments when the pain of inexplicable suffering bursts forth in the only way that it can: anger and frustration. It’s then that the eloquence of my prayer devolves into “God, damn it.”
Cancer? War? Poverty? Cruelty? God? If you’re listening, damn it! Damn this evil. Damn this suffering. Damn it. God, just damn it already.
The other day I was watching some videos of the great Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann . With a white beard covering his chin and the cadence of a preacher, in the videos he’s discussing lamentation in the Psalms, specifically, how lamentation can be a way of processing our suffering without enacting vengeance. (If you have a few minutes you can find them here , here and here .) Lament, he says, is a healthy and essential form of prayer and peacemaking. In lament we tell our God exactly how we feel, what we want… and we leave it for God to decide how to restore us to justice.
The language of lament is raw. Here’s an example from Psalm 58 :
O God, break the teeth in their mouth;
tear out the fangs of these young lions O lord;
let them vanish like water flowing away;
trodden down, let them wither like grass;
let them dissolve like a snail that oozes away,
like an untimely birth that never sees the sun.
Suddenly, like brambles or thistles,
have the whirlwind snatch them away.
Now that’s a lot of anger and pain. And there are others, lots of them. And boy are they dark. Dark enough to make me turn away from them sometimes, or at least approach them with a wary eye.
But Brueggemann argues that there’s a danger to the temptation we feel to distance ourselves from these psalms of lament (which make up fully one-third of the psalter!), and the danger is that we’ll ignore a simple truth: we actually feel this way. Enacting violence is unjustified, but without allowing anger and pain to burst forth around God we can communicate, especially to the young, that such feelings are abnormal, that we shouldn’t feel anger or pain. This is not good.
I’m certainly not the first Jesuit to wonder myself into such irreverent territory. It was Sir Anthony Hopkins who, in a famously spontaneous moment on “Inside the Actor’s Studio,” revealed that it was a Jesuit who taught him the shortest prayer there is: “Fuck it.” I think there are shorter ones even than this. Lose the ‘it’ and it seems to me that we’ve got ourselves a nice, four-letter prayer can capture our anger and pain pretty well.
These angry prayers are not just for Jesuits. An old nun I used to know would stretch a mischievous smile across her kind and gentle face as she’d proclaim, “There’s only one time when it’s alright to curse – when you’re naming the Devil and telling him to go straight back to hell!” Presuming I don’t end up in hell myself I look forward to seeing her again at the eternal banquet. I know she’ll be at the front door because she’s the only person I’ve ever known who remembered every person by name after meeting them once (apparently she recognized the Devil this way too). She was a good friend to have.
The point is this: it’s once we’ve hit the rock bottom of our potty-mouthed prayerbook that we can begin to climb back out again. And we do it by moving from simply letting our anger burst forth to sharing that anger with an Other. That’s when we take that four letter exclamatory prayer and add “it” to the end. It’s then that we’re moving from a release of raw emotion back to targeted exorcism. Two things have happened already, we’ve felt the frustration and identified the cause, and God? Well, include God and we’re finally asking for help, calling in for reinforcements. “Hey God! I’m hurting here. Please help!”
Try it for yourself:
Cancer, you S.O.B., you can go straight to hell!
Poverty and all your soul-sucking friends? You can go right behind the last one!
Addiction, death, despair, hate? God? Oh, I’m glad you’re here. God, damn it! Damn it. Damn it. Damn it.
Some days these are the only prayers I’ve got. On those days, I’m glad to know, as St. Paul assures us, that the Spirit prays in me. Deeper than the depths of my despair, sweeter than the sourness of my soul, the Spirit prays in me. And from my lips – after the doubting and the screaming, and the why’s and the no’s, and the why-have-you-forsaken-me’s and the God-damn-it’s – from my lips comes the softest prayer to be made: “I’m yours.”
I know it’s of the Spirit because it’s the only prayer worth a breath: I’m yours.
My God, I’ve got nothing left here.
I’m all cried out.
My voice is raw and my eyes are sore.
But here I am.
God damn it. Here I am.
I’m all yours.
prayersofapilgrim.wordpress.com
And don’t sin by letting anger control you. Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, for anger gives a foothold to the devil. (Ephesians 4:26,27) Whether I inherited a propensity to anger, whether I learned it, or whether it is a result of some trauma is immaterial. I (Jill) used to be a person prone to anger.
Aus:http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/prayerplainandsimple/2016/09/prayer…
17.10.2017 · And don’t sin by letting anger control you. Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, for anger gives a foothold to the devil.
Aus:http://
www.christianforums.com › Forums
Saying a prayer may help many people feel less angry and behave less … if they prayed for another person in … the wrath fades away, study suggests.
Aus:https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110321134714.htm
… Person Prayer for Peace #4 Prayer for Refugees and Victims of War Prayer for the Safety of a Soldier Prayer for a Sick Person Prayer for Strength to …
Aus:http://
www.catholic.org › Prayers
These Bible verses about anger tell us that anger does not bring out the righteousness of God, but instead stirs up wrath, produces folly, and often results in evil. Because of this, the Bible advises us to avoid being around people that are quick to anger and even bars them from any type of ministry.
Aus:https://www.praywithme.com/bible-verses-about-anger.html
The Serenity Prayer. God grant me the serenity To accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And wisdom to know the difference. (prayer attributed to Reinhold Neibuhr, 1892-1971) Read the full version of …
Aus:http://www.lords-prayer-words.com/topics/prayer_for_anger.html
My prayer changed from “holier-than-thou” to “Daddy God, please bless them and heal their heart because this is wounding Jesus, and I can’t stand for Jesus to be wounded anymore. Oh God, please overwhelm this person with Your love for them.” It became about Jesus, not about me.
Aus:https://www.fromhispresence.com/how-to-pray-for-those-that-hate-you
02.10.2012 · A great article and reminder that we need God to help us be the mothers He wants us to be. I never realized what a selfish person I was until a …
Aus:https://thecoblecolumn.wordpress.com/…/02/prayers-for-an-angry-heart
“She was a wonderful person, … Boston Marathon Bombing Prayer Christianity Angry Prayer Boston Marathon An Angry Prayer When Nothing Makes Sense. 340. 130.
Aus:https://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-ian-punnett/an-angry–prayer…
Titus 3:10-11 Reject a divisive man after the first and second admonition, knowing that such a person is warped and sinning, being self-condemned. Forgiving others. H elp us all to accept and forgive those who have failed to treat us with respect and dignity.
Aus:https://christianstt.com/prayer-dealing-with-difficult-persons
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