Prayer of Nonreligious Spiritual Caregivers

Abstract

To examine the beliefs of nonreligious spiritual caregivers, this study considered their activity to accept clients' “here and now” and simply stay beside the clients as “prayer.” Novelist Ōe Kenzaburō and photographer Fujiwara Shinya referred to the notion of a “prayer without religious faith.” Borrowing from their discussion, we defined a prayer as something in which people accept themselves as “nothing” when people face the limit of human power in extreme situations. This prayer is supported by a belief that “even though this happened, the world will continue.” Through this prayer, a person, who is nothing, tries to accept another person, who is nothing, and deceased people, who died as nothing, by looking after them with loving care. This belief and prayer is supported by the original Japanese perception of the evanescence of life and the tradition of memorial services for ancestors to communicate with living people.