Praise and adoration
Prayer that addresses God for who God is rather than asking for anything.
Prayer that honors God for who God is rather than for anything received, called in Catholic teaching the creature's first attitude before the Creator. The Psalms supply its classic vocabulary in every branch. In worship it opens liturgies and fills hymns; in teaching on private prayer it is usually placed first, before any asking begins.
Praise is the mode of prayer that asks for nothing. Christian teaching on prayer usually puts it first, on the grounds that a person who only ever asks has misunderstood the relationship, and most taught structures for prayer begin here.
In practice much of it is sung. Hymnody and worship music carry more praise than spoken prayer does, which is why traditions differ more visibly in their music than in their prayers.
It is also the mode people find hardest to sustain alone, and teachers of prayer say so frankly.
Does it have a text?
A mode of prayer rather than a prayer, so there is no text belonging to it as such. The psalms are the tradition's own model for it, and this site holds several in named public-domain editions.
When it comes up
Other forms of prayer in Christian
- Confession — Naming what has gone wrong, privately or in a congregation.
- Thanksgiving — Prayer that names what has been received.
- Petition — Asking for oneself.
- Intercession — Asking on behalf of someone else.
- Set and free prayer — The long argument between prayer that is written down and prayer that is not.
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.