Prayer - Conclusion

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We also want to draw your attention to the magic of the Roman Catholic prayers. Much is achieved and maintained in the Catholic church by means of prayer. They are addressed not to the Lord of all life and His hierarchy but to the Roman Catholic god on the other side of the veil. That is why all kinds of prayer books are used, filled with set prayers designed to maintain the binding between the masses of the Roman Catholic god. An entire pantheon of saints is maintained for the same purpose. The faithful are given some Our Fathers to recite, to be counted off on the rosary. By all these practices, those who pray are worked up to a great intensity of prayer. In this way, the Roman Catholic organizations in the reflection-sphere, who maintain the entire flock, are invoked.

One also thinks of prayers for the dying by means of the system of "in memoriam" cards. By these prayers the departed are seriously hampered if they try to free themselves from the grip of the church, because such prayers have the effect of re-animating the sacrament of extreme unction.

The priests exhort the church-going masses to pray often. This is quite understandable, for what is at stake is the unity of the church, maintained through the magic of public worship, the sacraments and prayer. It will be clear how dualistic this magic power is and how it debases prayer.

In Protestantism there is also much praying, but since it has no hierarchy in the reflection-sphere due to its dis-unity, it is a helpless prey for numerous forces in the reflection-sphere. The Roman Catholic hierarchy is active in this field and with more success than many could imagine. The Roman Catholic hold also exists in the General Synod.

Generally speaking, there are four things which motivate man to maintain his dualistic self-preserving nature. These are love, wealth, power and fame. He is driven by "love" in his sexual life and his love for possessions, his children, his own person, family, nation, tribe and race. The desire for wealth expresses itself in such things as striving to earn money, providing for old age, application to all kinds of studies, the development of ambition and the desire to see one's children get on in the world.

The craving for power expresses itself in such things as the desire to command respect, the manner in which people try to attain their objectives and the illusion of wanting to be "somebody".

The craving for fame finds expression in the great value that people attach to various national historical events and the high esteem they have for military glory, the system of orders of the knighthood, sports honors and so on.

Man's prayers are attuned to these motives and all kinds of dualistic miseries from within and without lead him, in his distress, to pray for his own preservation.

For the spiritually advanced and understanding person such motives have not the least significance. He prays for the spiritual welfare of his being. His prayer is aimed at the well-being of mankind and arises from altruism and not from selfishness. He prays for love, encompassing all things and all beings; for spiritual riches, so that he can help to liberate mankind from its distress; for glory so to become and be such that his life announces God's glory by his deeds.

The true magic invocation, the true prayer of the pupil, abides by the law never to ask anything for oneself. It is the complete surrender to the Divine Command: "Seek first the Kingdom of God and all things shall be added unto you". It is self-surrender with absolute faith in the Divine guidance.

Moreover, the pupil will realize that the quality and power of his prayers depend on his inner state with regard to consciousness, soul and body. Therefore, he will "live the Life" with all the strength that is in him.

From "Prayer" - Elementary Philosophy of the Modern Rosycross - Jan van Rijckenborgh

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Prayer - Part I

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Prayer is something that has degenerated considerably. For many it is only a habit based on the idea: "If it doesn't do any good, at least it will do no harm". For many, prayer is a mystical act kept up out of a certain reverence for something that has been handed  down from generation to generation. But nobody knows anymore what really happens or should happen.

In protestant life there is much praying. There are ministers who even develop prayer records. However, these do not impress the congregation very much but rather, arouse feelings of boredom, unless they attract attention by their emotionalism. Exceptions to this are rare. Countless people have given up prayer because they consider it nonsense.

Rosicrucians also pray. However, for them there is no question of acting out of mystical emotionalism or to express feelings of reverence, and certainly not out of habit. In this respect they have broken radically with tradition. The prayer of the Rosicrucian is based on the knowledge of a conscious process, for prayer is a magic invocation and every prayer is heard, although not in the sense imagined by the masses.

When we pray, we are thinking, willing and desiring. It is an activity of the whole human triangular fire and this results in creation. When we pray, we desire something that we grasp with our reason, supported by a certain feeling and rendered active by the spoken word. That is the creative fiat, the magic prayer. This process can be analyzed scientifically and it is easy to understand that the quality of prayer, the nature of the desire, motives, mentality and psychological state at that moment are decisive for the result.

There will be a result, because magic invocation travels as a force, a vibration, a creative unity, to  a sphere with which it corresponds in quality. Prayer then attracts forces from that sphere and the result will be in accordance with it. If man invokes God, Christ or the Holy Spirit out of his lower primitive state, prompted by a selfish desire, he will logically attract selfish forces, because he himself has invoked them by the black magic of his prayer. He invoked the "god", the force of his primitive imagination and it is this "god' who reacts. So there is always an answer to every prayer, although it is not always to our liking and corresponding to our intention. The well-known commandment warns against this kind of magic: "You shall not make yourself any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or on the earth or in the water under the earth".

It is said that a pyramid arises when we pray which vibrates and is coloured in conformity with our inner quality. Therefore, prayer can be something highly dangerous, for all misunderstood prayer turns against us. Such magic always results in the attainment of the unexpected. In practice it often happens that first of all we spoil things and get ourselves in a mess and then, when we see no solution to this self-created predicament we start to pray: "Oh, God, help us". Even the invocation "Oh, God". will turn against us. God is no servant of our animal or primitive state. It will be clear how undesirable this magic is.

End Part 1

From  "Prayer" - Elementary Philosophy of the Modern Rosycross - Jan van Rijckenborgh

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