Church Launches New Resource to Boost Nation's Prayer Life

The Church of England is looking to boost the nation's prayer life through the launch of a new resource targeting small study groups.

The latest initiative by the Church will use clips from a number of blockbuster movies such as, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Dead man Walking, and Truly, Madly, Deeply. The clips will be used as the start of a discussion about how God acts in the world today, and will focus on topics such as genuine listening, as well as the nature of human relationships.

The new resource entitled, 'Life Source', published this week is being touted as an "ideal" course for Lent study groups, and will encourage participants to "discover a new found joy and delight in prayer" by examining major aspects of a balanced prayer life, founded on the idea of prayer as relationship with God.

The course is divided into 90-minute sessions, which each use a Bible Study structure along with a range of interactive activities to introduce and explore different ways of praying, drawing from Christian heritage down the ages.

The authors of the project are Canon Robert Warren and Revd Kate Bruce, who designed the course to offer support to those new to the Christian faith who are seeking to develop their new-found relationship with God, as well as those longer-standing Christians who are looking for refreshment in their prayer life.

Kate Bruce, a chaplain at Durham University, reflects that "many people seem to experience a sense of guilt and failure around prayer, perhaps because we tend to treat prayer like a chore to be completed rather than a gift to be enjoyed; a task rather than the exploration of a relationship. We hope the book will maybe encourage people to engage more deeply in prayer."

Life Source specifically explores the use of five distinctive styles of prayer including The Lord's Prayer, lectio divina (a way of listening and responding to Bible passages), and Aaron's Blessing (taken from the Biblical Book of Numbers).

The book also contains a wealth of brief reflections to help in the discipline of prayer from writers such as the Rt Revd John Pritchard and the Rt Revd Stephen Cottrell, the Bishops of Jarrow and Reading.

The Rt Revd Christopher Herbert, Bishop of St Albans, has commended the course as "a book about praying which is rooted in God and in our humanity, full of good sense, encouragement and joy."

Last year's recommended Lent Course, Life Balance, sold more than 14,000 copies - more than one for every parish in the country.