Recently Steve Carlson of Sentinel Radio talked with Jon Harder, of Cape Porpoise, Maine, a Christian Science practitioner and teacher, about how to let go of personal anger and frustration—and pray more effectively to lessen their hold on the world.

Steve: Jon, as we look at the world, there are issues that generate a lot of controversy, to say the least. Whether people are thinking about events in the Middle East, or corporate scandals, or some other contentious issue, they sometimes find it difficult to know the best way to help. People may want to help through prayer, but how can you begin to pray and help those in need if you're burdened by anger and indignation, or despair or frustration?

Jon: I think the key word in what you ask is begin. How can you begin? And it can seem pretty dark. The atmosphere around us, even in our own neighborhoods or surrounding other parts of the world, can feel like it's being influenced more by heat than by light, to me—strong opinions, even hatred and anger felt by others, which in turn make us angry. That's heat rather than light. And I was realizing how those moments of clarity that come to us when we are willing to have them come, start me off in praying in a direction that I feel is helpful. Others also sometimes tell me this has been helpful to them.

To me, prayer isn't just a passive kind of thing. It's often misunderstood that way. But it is really doing something worthwhile, and our expectation can be that it does have an effect, even though so many would say it doesn't. I recall a situation that arose in a neighborhood where I lived. A couple of neighbors and I were getting together to talk about concerns that had to do with another person in the neighborhood, that person's property and what was to become of it.

In the middle of all of this, I said to both of these neighbors, "Well, my wife and I are really going to do some serious praying about this. And then we'll know better how to proceed and what we could recommend." Instantly they both shook their heads, and one of them startled me by saying, "No! Prayer isn't enough. We need to be proactive. We need to really do something."

I was a little taken aback by those words, having had other discussions about the power of prayer with these folks. And as I went back to my own home and thought more about what they had said, I realized that what I really needed to do was to confront a confused and disturbed mental atmosphere. Even in the middle of a clash of opinions, or great suffering, or unfairness, there can come a moment in which people are individually aware that God is here, God is there, and that God is speaking to us. A loving God is telling us, "I am here to lift you up. I am here to lift them up. I am giving you the power of My presence to feel not only comfort but the divine energy at work, to bring healing. To bring change where it needs to be felt. To be part of My purpose." Those are some of the things that I really believe one can feel as prayer goes forward.

In the situation that my neighbors and I were discussing, there was a change for the better, and everybody began to feel, gradually, that things were working out rightly. The way our concerns with our neighbor had worked out, and the calmness that emerged from the situation, was really something quite wonderful to behold.

Steve: Jon, how do you move from a point where you may feel very strongly about a particular issue—even angry or just despairing of there ever being any hope for a resolution because of the individuals involved? You might feel they are just not "getting it." How do you get beyond your personal frustrations to the point where you're willing to pray about the situation?

Jon: I really feel it's often at that moment when we feel most frustrated that we are most open to revelation, to the intelligent communication that comes from God, the one Mind of all. That may seem like a complete contradiction, but it isn't. I find it isn't just "letting go and letting God," as the cliché goes, but rather it's letting the Christ—God's communication—be felt. Letting it enter in.

To me, the Christ is very much the active, intelligent presence of God, felt with power. That is the very same power that animated Jesus. It made him what he was. It gave him all that he needed to accomplish everything that he did. That presence of God's intelligent power is here and now. It's timeless. It can be felt when we turn to it and acknowledge it. And as that begins to take over, the heat of emotion begins to give place to something else. It gives place to the calming, warm, enlightening presence of God's power. This involves our willingness to say in prayer, "Lord, what would You have me do? What would You have me know? What would You have me be more ready to do in order to help, so I don't just linger in the problem or contribute to the boiling atmosphere of anger?"

Steve: What if you're convinced you know what's right—and maybe you are right? But what if quite honestly you find that your prayers are colored by willfulness or self-justification? Even if you think you have let go of all the anger, what else has to be done?

Jon: To me, it comes down to a kind of unselfish moment in which there's a recognition that even the most deeply held opinions aren't the important thing—no matter how right you may feel. It's really about whether you're willing to give yourself to a solution that's really best for everybody. You can find that what is most important is a yielding of the human to the divine presence—that intelligent, Christly communication direct from God. That is the willingness, as the Apostle Paul wrote, "To be transformed by the renewing of your mind" (see Rom. 12:2). It isn't just a change of opinion. It isn't just a change of attitude. It is a readiness to let the penetrating light of the spirit of God—the Christ—go to work deep down, and raise the level of your thinking and your feeling, and allow that purifying action to enter in.

If I get started with that, I find I am not only much less apt to say, "Well, if only my neighbor across the street would change, then things would be better." Or, "If only my government had done something different...." All that begins to fade just long enough for that instant where I can feel the presence of God's actual power, and begin to feel His healing touch and the renewal that comes with it.

Steve: How can prayer have a real influence on a larger scale? Is that a kind of wishful thinking, or can it really?

Jon: I have certainly heard it said prayer is wishful thinking. But you know, people feel it when they are prayed for with a genuine caring, even at a long distance. People report this.

Political prisoners in decades gone by have reported feeling this kind of warmth and support. The one who prays can recognize that the presence of God is truly all-embracing. And everyone is responsive to it. I find the best moments, the most inspired moments, come from realizing that both I as the one who prays, and the one I am praying for, or the group which is being prayed for, are already safe in the keeping of the divine Mind. Within what God creates, everyone is pure, perfect, entirely spiritual, unlimited in capacity.

And that divine reality is the only one there is. It is at the very heart of prayer that is effective.

Mary Baker Eddy, the author of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, wrote: "All reality is in God and His creation, harmonious and eternal. That which He creates is good, and He makes all that is made" (p. 472). That's a very absolute statement. But it has wonderful power. When someone acknowledges it, and yields to the spiritual facts of it, then wonderful, welcome changes begin. And that includes the pacification of disputes. It includes right and just ways to deal with dishonesty in business or government. Wherever it happens to be, that divine influence penetrates, reaching to every part. Prayer is a deep acknowledgment and adoration of the power that does the work—the divine, intelligent presence.