There’s a wonderful line in Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s famous novel, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, set in the horror of a Soviet prison camp. One day Ivan is praying silently with his eyes closed when a fellow prisoner notices him and says, ‘Prayers won't help you get out of here any faster.’ Opening his eyes, Ivan answers, 'I do not pray to get out of prison, I pray to do the will of God.’ That is how we should be praying.
