There’s a famous book, Practicing the Presence of God, which is all about remembering that God is always with you, and trying to be conscious of that throughout the day. The world would indeed be a better place if we Christians all made an effort to do this.
But on top of this, we especially need to practice what I call the Public Presence of God. In modern society, God is increasingly marginalized. He is allowed to appear in Church on Sunday, but any presence anywhere else—at the court house, the school room, or the shopping mall—is hard to find. We live in a mostly secular world.
And this is not right. God is the Lord of the entire world, not just the buildings with crosses on them. So what can we do?
We can practice the Public Presence of God. We can practice the presence of God as we go about our day, and thereby bring Him everywhere we go. And we can especially do so in public places, and especially by praying.
In the 13th Century, the followers of St. Dominic would carry a ladder into the town square, mount to its top, and begin to preach. A crowd would gather, and all around would hear about the Word of God. That was practicing the Public Presence of God in a serious way. Unfortunately, in our world this is an increasingly impossible and ineffective thing to do. Impossible, because most public gathering places these days are either private property or constrained by separation of Church and State. Ineffective, because most people these days are inoculated against preaching by the constant bombardment of advertising on the one hand and polemic on the other.
But against earnest, heartfelt prayer, prayer for the good of those prayed for, there is no law. One can walk peacefully through a school, or a shopping mall, or an amusement park, and pray silently for everyone one sees, and God will hear, and God will be present.
The vineyard needs workers. If the vision of