You know, I probably do need to get out more often. Most people unwind with Netflix. I apparently unwind with 16th-century Jesuits.
I just finished reading the Examen of St. Ignatius Loyola, and something in it stopped me cold.
Ignatius makes a point that feels almost uncomfortable in its clarity: prayer must be followed by action. Not eventually. Not symbolically. Not when it’s convenient. But concretely.
He suggests that the person who seeks the spirit of God first in good works will actually find God more deeply in prayer later on than the person who seeks God first in prayer and only then — maybe — in action.
That flips the script on how many of us operate.
How often do we hear about someone’s misfortune — a death in the family, a medical diagnosis, a lost job, a quiet personal struggle — and instinctively say, “I’m sending my prayers”?
It sounds compassionate. It feels spiritual. It costs us nothing.
But Ignatius would likely look at that and ask: And then what?
Did you bring the meal?
Did you make the call?
Did you write the check?
Did you sit with them in the silence?
Did you show up?
Because while prayer matters — deeply — it cannot become a substitute for mercy in motion.
There’s something almost self-protective about “sending prayers.” It allows us to feel engaged without actually entering someone else’s suffering. It keeps the pain at a safe distance. We remain observers of hardship rather than participants in healing.
Ignatius, in his blunt Jesuit way, seems to suggest that if you truly want to encounter God, you won’t find Him by standing back and spiritualizing someone else’s crisis. You’ll find Him when you step into it.
And maybe that’s the harder truth.
It’s simply not enough to tell people who are hurting, grieving, or down on their luck that we are “sending our prayers.” Those words can comfort — but only if they are attached to something real.
Faith that never leaves the kneeler isn’t faith fully lived.
If someone is hungry, prayer should lead to food.
If someone is lonely, prayer should lead to presence.
If someone is overwhelmed, prayer should lead to help.
Otherwise, “I’m praying for you” risks becoming little more than a polite dismissal dressed in piety.
Ignatius understood something we sometimes forget: God is not only encountered in the chapel. He is encountered in the kitchen, the hospital room, the funeral home, the late-night phone call, the quiet check slipped into an envelope.
And perhaps — just perhaps — the prayer that follows that kind of action is the one that finally rings true.
The Valley Viewpoint 