Praying in Hard Times: 7 Practical Steps

David Szentgyorgyi Founder of the Saints

There's a particular kind of silence that follows bad news — the moment when someone who has prayed their whole life suddenly finds they have nothing to say to God, or worse, finds they're angry at him. That silence isn't a crisis of faith requiring a quick fix. It's one of the oldest experiences in the Bible, and Scripture itself gives it words when a person can't find their own.

Step one: stop expecting yourself to pray the way you used to

The first and most freeing thing to accept in a crisis is that prayer during suffering often looks nothing like prayer during ordinary life, and that this is not a spiritual failure. The Catechism describes prayer, at its core, as a raising of the heart and mind to God, a living relationship rather than a performance measured by eloquence or composure (CCC 2559). A single repeated word, a wordless sitting in silence, or a prayer that's mostly complaint counts as real prayer. The goal in a crisis isn't to sound the way you sounded before; it's to stay in contact.

A painting of an elderly, suffering man with a long white beard looking upward with arms outstretched in anguished prayer, evoking the biblical Job.

Painting evoking the biblical figure of Job in suffering and prayer — public domain.

Step two: let anger and grief be said out loud, to God directly

Scripture never asks grieving or frightened people to perform calm before God. The Psalms of lament — Psalm 22, which opens "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"; Psalm 13, which asks "How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?"; Psalm 88, one of the bleakest prayers in the Bible, which ends without resolution at all — model raw, unfiltered honesty directed straight at God rather than around him. Naming exactly what hurts, including anger at God himself, isn't a lapse in faith; it's one of the oldest and most scripturally grounded forms prayer can take.

Step three: borrow words when you don't have your own

There's no requirement to generate original prayers from scratch in the middle of a crisis, and trying to often makes things harder. Praying a Psalm of lament directly, slowly, even one line repeated several times, gives grief somewhere to go without requiring composition. The Our Father works the same way — its petition "deliver us from evil" carries different weight prayed from inside real suffering than it does on an ordinary Tuesday, and reciting it slowly can hold a person up when nothing else comes to mind.

Step four: don't confuse suffering with punishment

One of the most damaging ideas a person can carry into a crisis — often absorbed informally rather than taught outright — is that suffering must be deserved, payment for some past failure. The Gospel of John confronts this directly: when Jesus's disciples ask whether a man was born blind because of his own sin or his parents', Jesus rejects the premise of the question entirely (John 9:1-3). The Catholic Church does not teach that illness, grief, or tragedy are punishments sent by God for personal wrongdoing. Whatever meaning suffering can carry, it is never on those terms.

Step five: it's possible to unite suffering to Christ, without needing to feel that yet

Catholic teaching does hold that suffering, offered in union with Christ's own suffering, can become spiritually fruitful rather than simply wasted (CCC 1521), language rooted in Saint Paul's own words: "I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ's afflictions" (Colossians 1:24). This is worth knowing about, but it is not a feeling a suffering person needs to manufacture on demand, and it is never a claim that God caused the suffering in order to produce that fruit. It's an invitation available whenever, if ever, a person is ready for it — not a task added on top of an already difficult moment.

Step six: let other people carry some of the praying

Crisis is exactly the situation the Catholic understanding of intercessory prayer — asking others, living or among the saints, to pray on one's behalf — is built for. Asking a friend, a parish prayer chain, or a priest to pray for you isn't a lesser substitute for praying yourself; it's the Church acting as a single body, carrying weight together that one person alone often can't. There is no failure in saying plainly, "I can't pray right now — please pray for me."

Step seven: return to a small, steady rhythm as soon as you can

Once the sharpest edge of a crisis has passed even slightly, a short, simple, repeatable prayer practice — even just a minute at the same point each day — tends to help more than waiting to feel ready for something bigger. This mirrors the same principle behind a simple daily prayer routine: consistency matters far more than intensity, especially when energy and concentration are both in short supply. A single Our Father said at the same moment each day can function as an anchor point even on days when nothing else feels possible.

None of this needs to happen in order, or all at once

These seven steps aren't a checklist to complete in sequence during an active crisis — some days will only have room for step one, or step two, and that's enough. What holds them together is a single conviction at the center of Catholic teaching on suffering: that God does not abandon someone in pain, does not send suffering as punishment, and remains reachable even through anger, silence, or prayers that don't feel like they're landing anywhere. The Psalms of lament exist in Scripture precisely because that experience is universal and expected, not a sign that something has gone wrong with a person's faith. Staying in contact, however imperfectly, is what the whole practice comes down to.

Trivia

Is it a sin to feel angry at God during a crisis?

No. Anger and confusion directed at God in suffering are honestly expressed throughout Scripture, especially in the Psalms of lament, and Catholic spiritual tradition treats naming these feelings to God as a form of prayer rather than a failure of faith. What matters is bringing the anger to God rather than walling him off, which the Psalms themselves model repeatedly.

What are the Psalms of lament and how can they help during hard times?

Psalms of lament are a category of Psalms — such as Psalm 22, Psalm 13, and Psalm 88 — in which the psalmist honestly cries out to God from grief, fear, or a sense of abandonment, often before turning, though not always within the same psalm, toward trust. Praying them, especially when a person can't find their own words, gives voice to real suffering within a framework Scripture itself provides.

Does the Catholic Church teach that suffering is a punishment from God?

No. The Church explicitly rejects the idea that personal suffering is God's punishment for sin, a question directly addressed in the Gospel of John (John 9:1-3), where Jesus rejects the assumption that a man's blindness was caused by anyone's sin. Catholic teaching instead holds that suffering, while never willed by God as an evil in itself, can be united to Christ's own suffering and given meaning (CCC 1521, drawing on Colossians 1:24).

What does it mean to 'unite suffering to Christ'?

It refers to the Catholic understanding, rooted in Saint Paul's language in Colossians 1:24, that a person's suffering, offered in union with Christ's own suffering on the cross, can become spiritually fruitful rather than simply wasted pain. This is a matter of personal devotional offering, not a claim that the suffering itself was sent or willed by God for that purpose.

Is it okay to pray very short, simple prayers during a crisis instead of longer ones?

Yes. Catholic spiritual tradition has long recognized short, repeated prayers — sometimes just a name, a single line, or wordless attention — as fully valid prayer, particularly in states of exhaustion or grief where longer, more composed prayer isn't possible. The Catechism describes prayer as fundamentally a relationship and a raising of the heart to God (CCC 2559), not a performance measured by length or eloquence.