The past few weeks I have been thinking about when we prayer together and recently these remarks by Thomas R. Steaglad from A House of Prayer: The Power of Praying in Community found their way to my inbox,

Why do so many praying Christians feel as if their prayers “die at the ceiling” or echo in the dark? Perhaps something crucial is missing.

I suggest that what’s missing is the sense and the experience of deep connection and real community: of spiritual intimacy not only with God but with other praying believers. Believing and praying others, members of our spiritual family who gather with us … are a gift of God to absorb the echo of isolated orisons. Believing, praying others help us hoist before God the concerns that are too heavy for any one of us alone to lift “past the ceiling.”

I believe God has placed it in our hearts to pray together: to meet in some place and time, to give ourselves to some form or fashion, to pray both with and for one another. When we don’t pray like that, or do so only rarely, we sense the loss even if we cannot articulate it — as when we hunger for something we cannot name.

What do you find when you pray with others?