By Anna Weaver | Hawaii Catholic Herald

Jesus said, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” For the past few years, thanks to the ease and accessibility of modern communication technology, Hawaii Catholics are “gathering together” by phones and on computers to pray for others.

At least three Hawaii parishes have developed electronically-linked groups who assemble from their homes and offices as often as every day to pray for sick family members, friends facing surgery, parishioners going through difficult times, people who have died, and a multitude of other special concerns.

While many members never meet face-to-face, they are united in their spiritual efforts.

Share the prayer Of course, not all collective prayer originates in parishes. The following two groups also practice creative communal praying. Priest-a-day prayer calendar During a gathering a few years ago, the Secular Franciscan Order in Hawaii decided to begin praying for a different Hawaii priest each day. According to the group’s formation director, Ron Drum, it was “a new way the Holy Spirit would inspire us to help others.” The group drew up a six-month calendar with each day dedicated to one priest. The calendar with an accompanying prayer is distributed to parish priests, who are asked to make copies available in the church for parishioners to take home. Some parishes print the list in their Sunday bulletins. “These priests … need a little extra help,” Drum said. “They don’t know if their work is being approved or appreciated. And this way, it’s just a little prayer so they know that they are going to be remembered.” Convent posts parish intentions For more than a decade, the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts at Regina Pacis Convent in Kaimuki have dedicated each week of prayer to a different parish in the Diocese of Honolulu. Sister Regina Mary Jenkins said, “As a community, we thought we could do one thing that is part of our charism, and that is pray, and particularly for our state and our diocese here.” The coordinator of this effort is Sister Julie Louise Thevenin, who sends out a card to each parish a month ahead of their scheduled prayer week, asking if there are any particular parish intentions. When the cards are returned, they are put up on the convent’s prayer board. The week that a parish is prayed for, the sister leading daily prayer specifically mentions the parish and its pastors. The Sacred Hearts Sisters also recently began encouraging people to visit their community chapel (with access through the garden) anytime between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. for prayer and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.

Prayer chain

St. Elizabeth Parish in Aiea developed a “prayer chain” in 1998 as part of its outreach ministry program. Today more than 30 people participate.

Started as a telephone tree, the chain has since expanded into three subgroups. The first group is for those reachable only by phone during the day, the second for those who can be contacted at night, and the third for those who can be reached by e-mail.

Flo Johnasen, who has been involved with the prayer chain for five years, recently became the e-mail chain coordinator.

“I thought it was an easy way to do a ministry without having to physically be somewhere yourself,” she said. “With the prayer chain you can be anywhere. All I need is my computer and I can check my e-mail.”

Prayer petitions are fielded to Johnasen and Dot Nakata, who helped start the group, through St. Elizabeth’s parish secretary Bernie Teson, who receives them from the parish priests and other sources. Many intentions come through members of the prayer chain themselves.

A recently installed “brown box” at the church also offers a convenient drop-off spot for anyone’s prayer intentions. Johnasen’s sister, Ida Kim, collects the box’s contents every day and passes them on to her.

Nakata says being involved in the chain is very rewarding.

“To me it’s a wonderful ministry,” she said. “I like praying for people.”

Prayers are usually requested for people experiencing health problems, but it is not unusual to have someone requesting God’s guidance in raising a troublesome child or for help with a job interview. People who have asked for spiritual assistance occasionally follow up with requests for prayers of thanksgiving or for the repose of someone’s soul.

“The whole thing about the prayer chain is that you pray according to what your thing is,” said Johnasen, 67, a secretary to the general counsel at Hawaiian Electric Company. “You make it as part of your own ritual.”

Nakata reemphasized that point. There are no rules for the method or length of prayer, said Nakata, who at 77 is retired and cares for her mother at home. She spends about an hour each morning in prayer over a list of as many as 200 names of people whose concerns have come to the attention of the chain. If interrupted, she’ll return to prayer later.

Nakata says she keeps praying for people until she hears about what happened with them.

“Sometimes I think when I’m wondering about a person, God will let me know,” she says, whether it be through newspaper obituaries, an update from another person, or running into them, like she recently did with one man at her doctor’s office.

Johnasen said, “We cannot underestimate the power and value of prayers. Simply hearing that someone is praying for you is so nice to have.”

When she had hip surgery recently the prayer chain prayed for her. “I know that having the prayers said for me helped,” she said, noting how quickly she healed.

Prayer hotline

Star of the Sea Parish in Waialae-Kahala has a “prayer hotline.” It consists of four parishioners available by phone during the day to pray with people right then and there when they call. The volunteers, who go by aliases for privacy, list their numbers and the times they are available in the parish bulletin.

“Madge,” a prayer hotline volunteer, said that callers “just want someone to actually pray with them for this individual or for themselves.”

The hotline demonstrates that people in need don’t have to be alone, she said.

“A lot of times they will call back and thank us for their prayers,” she said, even if the request was not answered in a way the person might have originally wanted.

“Prayers are always answered,” Madge explained, “but not always in our way of thinking.”

The hotline, which was started by Marist Brother Roy Madigan when he was at Star of the Sea, came out of a regular prayer meeting at the church.

“You just feel like you have been of some help to someone who is really in need of prayer,” Madge said.

“Or even just of the idea that you can open up to someone” is helpful, she said.

Prayer network

For more than 15 years, St. Joseph Parish in Hilo has run a “prayer network.” Kathleen Choi, then a parishioner at St. Joseph, began the group because she wanted to be involved in a church ministry while poor health prevented her from leaving home.

Like St. Elizabeth’s prayer chain, the prayer network started out as a telephone tree. As more people got e-mail, prayer requests were also sent that way. Today the group has 19 members using e-mail and seven connected by phone.

Prayer requests are e-mailed to Choi through the parish secretary Robyn Whittington, and Choi forwards the requests through e-mail and phone calls a few times a week. Choi, a columnist for the Hawaii Catholic Herald, continues to coordinate the St. Joseph network though she is now a parishioner at the neighboring Immaculate Heart of Mary in Papaikou.

Flossie Fergerstrom has been a member of the network’s phone tree since almost the beginning.

“When the patient or whomever it is knows that there are that many people thinking about them and talking to the Lord about them, they have great confidence in their own way of getting well,” said the 78-year-old retiree.

Fergerstrom recounts the story of a man with cancer of the esophagus, who did not know the prayer network existed until she told him about it.

“When I informed him that we were going to put him on our prayer list, he was quite enthused,” she said. “It’s been six years now and he is well. He keeps thinking that the power of prayer was just there.”

One of the network’s e-mail participants, Carol Denis, said that last August when she was going to have a heart angioplasty she put her own name on the prayer list. She eventually didn’t need to have surgery.

“I feel it’s a good way to keep our church strong and our church united,” said Denis, 54, a state eligibility worker.

It shows “the general support we give each other,” she said, “to know that we care and that we are praying for each other.”