Reunderstanding prayer

"prayer as a natural conversation with God - not a "follow this pattern" is an interesting statement. I kind of warm to it but I think it is also a sentiment that can be misleading and inhibit our spiritual growth in certain circumstances. I deal with the issue in "Praying the pattern" but let me just overview some of the issues.

First, don't hear me to say that I don't think that we shouldn't try to relate to God 'naturally', I just am not sure what that really means beyond the sloganeering.

• Jesus expected us to use a pattern to relate to God at least some of the time: that's what the Lord's prayer is.
• What is 'natural' about conversing with a being whose normal vocabulary and speech usually includes things that are beyond the human vocal tract and can and does transcend speech?
• Do we acknowledge that mostly what we mean by 'conversing naturally' is actually only a part of our conversational repertoire and may not always be relevant to God-communing?
• Do we realise how ideological/mythical is this meme about prayer?

To help understanding my position, perhaps I should say that I very much agree with the whole thing about prayer without the drama -I think: I'm working on a book/ big article about group prayer on the assumption that God is already in on the conversation before we 'deign' to turn to prayer. In doing so I analyze the dynamics of normal conversation and show how prayer isn't normal conversation and how we might make it more that way.
john o'keefe