In our article Making Reading Sacred, we present a series of practices to accompany and enhance your reading experience:

• "Before you open a book, take a moment to give thanks to God for gifting its creator with the time, energy, creativity, and cooperation needed to make it possible for you to read it now.

• "Treat the space where you are reading as a sacred place. Try to eliminate all distractions. Turn off the phone. Close the door. Make a commitment to focus all of your divinely endowed energies of attention and imagination on the text."

Gary D. Schmidt, an English professor at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Elizabeth Stickney, author of The Loving Arms of God, are editors of this collection of prayers, both ancient and modern. They hope it will serve as a companion for those who are writing books and for those who enjoy reading about writers and their challenges.

This paperback includes sections on The Writer Encounters the World, The Writer Studies the World, The Writer's Vision Expands, The Writer Attends to the Word, and The Writer Finds Joy in the Work. Here you will find prayers by John Donne, St. Augustine, John Berryman, Thomas Merton, C. S. Lewis, Rainer Maria Rilke, and many others.

Here are two samples:

"God give me work
Till my life shall end
And life
Till my work is done."
— Winifred Holtby

"Be on our lips, that we may speak no evil word.
Be in our eyes, that they may never linger on any forbidden thing.
Be on our hands, that we may do our own work with diligence, and serve the needs of others with eagerness.
Be in our minds, that no soiled or bitter thought may gain an entry to them.
Be in our hearts, that they may be warm with love for Thee, and for our fellow-men.
— William Barclay