“...prayer makes us more sensitive to the manifestations of institutionalized lies.”

“Are we willing to shun vain repetition and keep our prayers out of an unchallenging rut by asking God to make us more sensitive to our own sin?”

“Prayer, it seems, disposes us to new friendship, in that it more and more lays us open to experience from any source, makes us sensitive to every aspect of existence, every leaf, every ray of light, every sorrow, every pain.”

“Suffering does make us more sensitive until it crushes us completely.”

“The primary purpose of prayer is not to make requests. The primary purpose is to praise, to sing, to chant. Because the essence of prayer is a song, and man cannot live without a song. Prayer may not save us. But prayer may make us worthy of being saved.”

“Yoga practice can make us more and more sensitive to subtler and subtler sensations in the body. Paying attention to and staying with finer and finer sensations within the body is one of the surest ways to steady the wandering mind. (39)”