Whenever one of the desert fathers taught his disciples to pray, he would always begin by telling the following story about himself.

A priest was kneeling at a roadside shrine just outside the town saying his prayers. As he was in the middle of his prayers, a young woman passed very close to the shrine and distracted the priest.

The priest flew into a rage and said, “You insolent girl, can’t you see I’m saying my prayers? Why must you disturb me when I am praying?”

“I’m so very sorry Father,” the young girl said, “I didn’t even notice you. I’m on my way to see my boyfriend and I was just thinking so much about him that I didn’t even see you!”

“Well, can’t you see that I was thinking about God?” the priest shouted piously.

Now there was an elderly man who had been traveling along the same road who heard this conversation. The old man walked up to the priest and said, “Let me see if I have this right—The young woman here was thinking about her boyfriend so deeply that she didn’t notice you. You were thinking about God, but you noticed her. If you loved God with the same earnest, wholesome devotion as she loves her boyfriend, you could share the same road in peace, could you not?”

The Desert Father who began his teaching on prayer with that story, always ended his teaching on prayer by saying, “Prayer is about love. It is not a matter or saying words. It is a matter of being loved and returning love. By its very nature it will consume you.”

The next time you pray, remember what it is really about. It’s about being loved and returning love.