Revisiting Twain's "War Prayer" with a "Peace and Prosperity Prayer"

It is the beginning of a beautiful autumn day. A mild and playful breeze meanders across the valley. The mountains stand majestically, keeping a watchful eye on the people below. Crimsom-tipped leaves glimmer at the first touch of the morning sun. Fathers, awakened by a radio talk show, get dressed while checking e-mail on their home laptops. They cook a quick, nutritious breakfast while watching the morning news and checking stocks on their cell phones. Every movement is purposeful and calculated to use time efficiently. Time, after all, is money, and these fathers are responsible, successful providers. They finish eating, and with a quick “I love you” to their wives, they jump in their new luxury car, turn on the satellite radio, and drive quickly to the office to get a head start on the days work.

Children prepare for school quickly, getting dressed and eating breakfast to the rythmic music emanating from their headphones, accompanied by the constant beat of clicking cell phone buttons. They are excited to see their friends at school, and to somehow impress that certain girl or guy. Faint chatter about the release of the newest videogame, or album, or itouch reverberates around kitchen walls. They may not always have the latest ipod or smart phone, but if they get good grades and behave themselves, Dad will get it for them soon. Life is comfortable, because they live in America, where anyone can have a happy, fulfilling life if they work hard enough. When they finish eating, they run to catch the bus, music blasting in their ears.

Mothers, having reviewed the important events of the day before blowing a kiss to the kids and rushing out the door, slide into their luxury mini-vans, cell phone between shoulder and ear. Having already done morning pilates, cooked breakfast, and tidied up the house, the day still contains school board meetings, corporate presentations, charity events, and blog updates. There is a lot to be done, but the help provided through hand-held electronic planners and portable, purse-sized laptops and tablets makes things manageable.

These are bright and successful American families, bursting with activity and purpose. They have worked hard to provide a good living for themselves. For them the world is full of opportunities, if only they are prepared to take advantage of them. After school, the children are car-pooled to band practice, voice lessons, and sports practices. Mom and Dad meet briefly to pick out a sofa for the entertainment room. When the kids get home, there is a mad race for the TV remote and the right to choose what to watch first. Homework is half-heartedly flipped through during commercials until Mom gets home. “No TV until after dinner.”

Dad comes home to find dinner ready. Everyone eats quickly, chattering about the day's happenings. Finally the hustle and bustle of the day has wound down. The children gather around the computer after dinner to see the latest viral YouTube video. They soon tire of YouTube and disperse to their own rooms, some to check their Facebook account, others to watch a movie on their laptop. The youngest girls play with their Webkins animals, dressing and feeding them in their online home. Mom sits in a comfy chair to read with her kindle, closing the drapes to block out the last golden rays of sunlight shining through the living room window.

Having finished his work, Dad plops down on the sofa to watch the end of the basketball game. He relaxes for a while, basking in the light from his big screen TV. Turning to his wife, he comments, “Now this is the life. Remember when we first started out, and we didn't have anything to our names? Now we have everything we ever wished for. That's what makes America great! Anyone can make it and be happy if they just persevere.”

Just at that moment, the phone rings. --- “Hey, this is your neighbor Jim. There's some kind of meeting been called over at the local chapel. You wanna go?” --- “Well, I suppose I can spare a few minutes. You know what it's about?” --- “Nah, I just heard about it. My wife saw some kind of flyer earlier today about an important meeting.” --- “Alright, I'll see you there in a few minutes.”

A handful of curious men and women slowly file into the ornately decorated chapel. An older, distinguished looking man in a dark suit sits comfortably on a chair next to the podium. He looks warmly in the direction of the entering people and nods his head. As he meets the gaze of individuals, they feel an almost invasive discomfort, as if he can see into their very souls. Another man stands up, introducing himself and thanking everyone for attending.

“This man has an important message to give us. Please listen to his counsel.”

The older man then rises and, with a deep, powerful voice, begins to address the congregation.

“My brothers and sisters. My message is short, but it is of greatest importance. I am a messenger sent from above, a spokesman for the Almighty. We live in a time, my dear brothers and sisters, when abundance and prosperity abound. Many of you have created comfortable and successful households that are filled with the necessities and luxuries of life. You have dedicated much of your lives to achieving financial stability and success, which has allowed you to acumulate the latest innovations in information and technology. With these innovations have come greater comforts and opportunities for enjoyment. You say in your hearts, “we are providing a comfortable and easy life for our children, giving them all the benefits that will help them to succeed in life, the benefits you didn't have. Children inevitably live in the same manner and form as their parents. They will live as you live. In the freedom of independent life they will grasp after wealth, fame, or popularity, thinking that these are the ends of their labors. They will rush about always measuring their success against the success of the people around them, leading to a perpetually expanding vision of prosperity and expectations.

There is an interesting phenomenom found in this infusion of technology and comfort. While it seems that your lives are blessed by the increased convenience and connectivity to the people around you, you slip farther and farther away from each other. Families who spend whole evenings under the same roof barely speak to each other. Children who have much to learn from parents' experience and wisdom spend hours gaining “knowledge” from the endless recesses of the internet. Rather than revel in the beauty of the world around them, they sit inside sending electronic messages back and forth, bragging about their adventures in the world of virtual existence/entertainment that they call videogames. Perhaps it is better that way, after all, to live in a virtual world where mistakes don't really count, and where morality and responsiblity hold no importance because they are not real. Perhaps in the end the children of the information age will find their salvation by avoiding life and its problems, feeding their temporal desires in proxy, limiting their exposure to the conflicts of human interaction. You desire these things for them, yet you desire for them growth and eternal happiness as well. You will find that you will attain only one of these desires, and it may surprise you in the end which result will bring you more dissappointment and sorrow.”
A Messenger:

With a final, penetrating glance, the man turns and sits in his chair. Nobody moves for a few minutes. They are unsure what to think about such a strange speech. An unusual sensation washes over some, a slight tremble across their bodies, almost like the chills. Others experience a rising sense of indignation at the man's words, offended that he would propose to judge them. What does he know anyway? He is stuck in the traditions and values of the past. He doesn't understand our generation, and he doesn't know what is best for us!

Below is the original "War Prayer," by Mark Twain

It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing and spluttering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spread of roofs and balconies a fluttering wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts, and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country, and invoked the God of Battles beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpourings of fervid eloquence which moved every listener. It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their personal safety's sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way.

Sunday morning came -- next day the battalions would leave for the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were there, their young faces alight with martial dreams -- visions of the stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender! Then home from the war, bronzed heroes, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor, there to win for the flag, or, failing, die the noblest of noble deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation

*God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest! Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!*

Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory --

An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher's side and stood there waiting. With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued with his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, "Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!"

The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place. During some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes, in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep voice he said:

"I come from the Throne -- bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import -- that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he who utters it is aware of -- except he pause and think.

"God's servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two -- one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of Him Who heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this -- keep it in mind. If you would beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.

"You have heard your servant's prayer -- the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it -- that part which the pastor -- and also you in your hearts -- fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is sufficient. the *whole* of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory--*must* follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!

"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.

(*After a pause.*) "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!"

It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.