The pastoral prayer
The long prayer offered on behalf of a whole congregation during worship.
A substantial intercessory prayer offered by the minister on the congregation's behalf during Sunday worship, historically nicknamed the long prayer. It gathers the week's concerns, from sick members to the wider world, into one spoken act of adoration, confession, thanksgiving and petition. The custom remains strongest in Reformed and traditional evangelical worship, though many contemporary services have shortened or dropped it.
The pastoral prayer is the point in a service where one person prays aloud for everyone. It usually moves through praise, confession, thanksgiving and intercession, and it names things: people who are ill, people who have died, events in the town, events in the world.
It is where a congregation hears its own week described. In many churches the names are gathered beforehand and read, which makes it the closest Protestant equivalent to the Jewish Mi Sheberach list.
It is normally led by the minister, and its length is a recognisable feature of particular traditions.
Does it have a text?
Usually composed fresh, sometimes written out beforehand and read. Either way it belongs to the occasion it was written for, so there is no standing text to publish.
When it comes up
Other forms of prayer in Protestant
- Extemporaneous prayer — Prayer composed in the moment, in the speaker's own words.
- Liturgical prayer and the Daily Office — Set prayers and set hours, kept by the traditions that retained them.
- The prayer meeting — A gathering whose only business is praying together, usually mid-week.
- Grace at meals and household devotion — Prayer at the table, and the habit of family prayer at home.
- Charismatic and Pentecostal prayer — Prayer expecting the immediate activity of the Spirit, including prayer in tongues.
This page describes a practice. It does not tell you how to perform it, or whether you should. Practice varies by region, community and household far more than a page like this can carry, and nobody credentialed in the tradition has signed anything here. The full dossier names its sources.