"You're in my thoughts and prayers."

"I'll pray about it."

"Let's keep him in prayer."

If you grew up in the Church as I did, you know that these stock phrases have many meanings, some of them beautiful, and some, well, not. At their best, these invocations to prayer mean what they sound like: "I'm engaged, I'm intentional, I'm compelled by love to seek God's presence in this hard moment."

At their worst, though, they can mean the opposite: "I'm busy; I'm jaded; I'm too distracted, disengaged, or compromised to move with compassion in this circumstance. I'm not willing to change, so let's hope God performs a magic trick that requires nothing from me."

I don't mean to sound snarky or judgmental. I've used the "I'll pray about it" line in both ways myself. I have prayed from an earnest, brimming heart, asking God for the will to act on behalf of people I care about. But I have also prayed out of laziness, apathy, fear, and spite. I've said, "Sure, I'll pray about it," when what I really mean is, "I'm not interested, but I'm too chicken to say 'no' to your face." Or, "I'm going to pray for you," when what I really mean is, "I don't like you, so I'm going to ask God to change you into someone more palatable." Or, "I'll pray for her," when what I really mean is, "I'm too self-absorbed to cook a meal, visit a hospital room, write a check, or alter my schedule on her behalf. But I'll pray!"

It's been two weeks since Omar Mateen walked into a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, and killed 49 people. In the days that followed the massacre, social media exploded with arguments about the appropriateness and efficacy of prayer. "The victims' families are in our thoughts and prayers," some members of the U.S Congress wrote to their constituents. "We don't need your thoughts and prayers; we need responsible gun control," some angry citizens wrote back. "Prayer is our hope and refuge right now," many believers insisted. "No, prayer is a mockery. A cop-out for the weak-willed," many skeptics responded.

To ask what role prayer should play in the face of ongoing tragedy, injustice, and oppression is to raise the hardest questions I can think of about God — questions I have no idea how to answer. Does God intervene directly in human affairs? Does his intervention — or lack of it — depend in any way on our asking? Can prayer "change" God? Do our prayers have tangible effects on other people, even when those people have no idea that we're praying for them?

As has been the case in many areas of my faith life, my beliefs about prayer have evolved from certainty into mystery. I was raised to believe that God intervenes very directly in human affairs, and that intercessory prayer has powerful and undeniable "real world" effects. As a child, I believed with all my heart that prayer heals diseases, prevents car accidents, feeds hungry children in far away countries, fends off nightmares, prevents premature death, and "stops the bad guys." As a teen and young adult, much of this certainty collapsed under the weight of life experience — some diseases didn't get better, car accidents happened, I had nightmares, babies starved, young people died, and "bad guys" won gruesome victories. When I asked my elders to explain these discrepancies, they gave me two answers: 1) You need to pray with more faith, and 2) Sometimes God's answer is no. Both answers struck me then — and strike me now — as lame.

Today, I live along the borders of a more complicated world. I still have friends and family members who pray for parking spots, lost house keys, Little League victories, and Ivy League admissions for their children. But I also have friends who eschew intercessory prayer on principle, convinced that the true purpose of prayer has nothing to do with asking God "for stuff." In their words: "He's God. Not Santa Claus."

Me? I waver. A few days ago, my daughter took her first international flight alone. 14 hours across the Pacific Ocean. Did I spend those hours praying for her safety? Heck, yes. Days before that, though, I read "prayers for Orlando" posts from political leaders in Washington, and felt nothing but frustration and outrage. I believe in prayer, yes, but I don't believe in using it to mask passivity.  

In the end, the challenge of intercessory prayer is that it's subjective. What looks like God's "yes" in my eyes might easily look like his "no," his silence, or even his non-existence in yours. As Barbara Brown Taylor puts it, "The meaning we give to what happens in our lives is our final, inviolable freedom." When is an "answer to prayer" really an answer? When is it coincidence? Randomness? A trick of the light? The cost of our liberty — a cost God daily chooses to endure — is that we can't say for sure. Not in this lifetime.

So why do I pray? I pray because I am compelled to do so. Because something in me cries out for engagement, relationship, attentiveness, and worship. I pray because my soul yearns for connection with an Other who is God, and that connection is best forged in prayer. With words, without words, through laughter, through tears, in hope, and in despair, prayer holds open the possibility that I am not alone, and that this broken, aching world isn't alone, either. I pray, as C.S Lewis writes, "because I can't help myself." Because "the need flows out of me all the time — waking and sleeping."

I pray because I am a better, braver, kinder, and softer human being when I do. I no longer know if prayer changes God. But I know for sure that it changes me.