I heard of "praying with your feet" indirectly from Mat. Anna Crawford's blog, and I do it often on Sundays. For about a year now, I have been baking prosfora for our church. I try to find a time when the kids are occupied so that I can bake prayerfully. I always begin by praying that God might make a worthy offering of the bread although it comes from mine unworthy hands. Sometimes He does...sometimes not so much.
Tonight I had my two children and two others with me when my husband reminded me that we need bread for tomorrow. I had put the children down for bed about thirty minutes before he came home with this reminder. So, I thought I would jump on the task immediately so as not to be up too late tonight. I prayed. I scooped out my tablespoon of yeast, heated 1/4 cup of water to mix with 1 3/4 cups, mixed it together, added my teaspoon of salt and 6 cups of flour, and began to knead.
A few minutes into the kneading process three of four children were up. I had to stop to chase one perambulating baby in need of a diaper change, quiet a chattering toddler who was riling up her older sister, and calm said sister before kissing her goodnight again. As I returned to my bread in the same way I return to liturgy after dealing with children, I was reminded that there are indeed many ways to pray and sometimes even without knowing it I do pray constantly throughout the day. I pray with words when I ask or thank God for blessing my family and when we gather in the icon corner to say evening prayers (I can barely get my family ready and out the door in time as it is and never manage to say proper morning prayers), but I pray with my hands when I bake, and with my feet when I am about the business of raising my daughters as Christians to the glory of God (to the best of my ability and certainly with a lot of His Grace).
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