When Prayer Feels Dark, Desire Grows Deep

Blog by Alan Fadling

I’ve been in the Anglican Church for a dozen years now, and I’ve been an Anglican priest for about half that time. In recent years, I’ve found myself returning often to voices from my Anglican heritage. These writers do not rush us toward spiritual triumph or tidy answers. They are patient guides, attentive to the actual experience of prayer as it unfolds over time, including its shadows. One such guide is Reginald Somerset Ward, whose reflections as a spiritual director on prayer feel as bracing and grace-giving now as when they were first written nearly a century ago.

Ward urges us to recognize that faithful prayer will not always feel warm, clear, or energizing. He speaks directly to those seasons most of us know from experience but quietly mistrust. He asks,

“And what can possibly be the meaning of this coldness and darkness of the soul? Surely it is God’s test. How should we ever grow without tests?” (To Jerusalem, p. 148)*

What are we to make of those seasons when prayer feels cold and dim, when energy drains away and God seems strangely distant? These moments might not be signs of failure at all but rather invitations. They are a kind of testing, meant not to discourage us but to strengthen us. We tell God that we want him deeply, and in response we discover what that wanting is really made of. When prayer no longer feels warm or clear, we find out whether our desire is a strong intention or a faint wish.

Ward presses even further, naming what is revealed when we keep praying without consolation:

“For the measure by which God values our prayers is the amount of desire in them, and it shows much greater desire to pray in darkness than in light.” (To Jerusalem, p. 148)

If our longing is true, we stay. We keep showing up. We pray not because it makes us feel alive but because love has taught us to remain attentive and ready, like a runner poised at the starting line. And something hidden but important happens then. The darkness does not block prayer; it sharpens it. Desire becomes more honest, more muscular. A deeper longing is revealed when we choose to pray without consolation than when everything feels bright and easy.

In such moments, prayer becomes less about experience and more about allegiance.

Ward reminds us that this kind of prayer is not sustained by intensity alone. Desire itself is a gift. We have been given a longing for God that leans forward, urging us on even when we feel depleted. What remains is learning how to tend that desire faithfully over time.

I have learned the truth of this slowly. When I decide how I will pray and return to that intention with regularity, something grows more deeply rooted in my soul. Still, I feel the familiar pull to abandon prayer when it stops feeling productive or satisfying. Yet that would be like an athlete quitting training because they find it uncomfortable. The training is not an end in itself. It is preparation. It is what readies us for a moment of faithfulness that lies ahead, when what has been quietly formed in us is finally called upon.

For Reflection:

• Where has prayer felt cold or dim for me lately, and what story am I telling myself about that season?
• When prayer no longer feels rewarding, what usually determines whether I keep showing up or quietly withdraw?
• In what ways might God be forming allegiance in me right now, rather than offering consolation?

* R. Somerset Ward. To Jerusalem: Devotional Studies in Mystical Religion. Edited and introduction by Susan Howatch. Library of Anglican Spirituality. Mowbray, 1994.