[metmom]

While prayer can be simple conversation, that does not mean all simple conversation is prayer.

No, intercessory prayer WITH and FOR other believers isn’t the issue. I don’t pray TO other believers.

And plenty of prayers TO Mary have already been posted that demonstrate that those prayers are way beyond simple conversation. I do not commit my whole being body and soul to other believers to live for them nor do I ask them to do for me what only God can do.

[Mrs. Don-o]

"No, intercessory prayer WITH and FOR other believers isn’t the issue. I don’t pray TO other believers."

Yeah you do, because prayer in this sense is communication. Any time you have communication -- especially in the Lord--- especially spiritual conversation, with any other believer, that is prayer as we understand it.

The big misunderstanding comes in when people suppose that "pray" and "adore" are in every case synonyms.

Speaking as a homeschooling mom (here I give my glasses in an officious tilt) everyone past middle school knows that words can have more-restrictive and less-restructive meanings, the exact understanding of which is going to depend on genre, custom, interpretive community, context.

Prayer in the sense we are speaking of, is not adoration; it is contact or communication.

In this sense, if I say "Metmom, please pray for me and mine" --- I am praying to you.

It always used to mean that, but now it sounds antique:

"Pray, m'lady, wilt thou grant me a boon?"