Noted women talk about prayer

By The Associated Press NEW ORIEANS – Life has its crossroads its searing intervals when a person momenta~ily isn’t sure which way to go or what to do, but in which the situation compels a choice. Out of experiencing such crises, four noted women say the answers come through prayer . “In faith , you turn to the source in times of stress and there’ll always be direction ,” says Coretta Scott King. “It may not be what you asked for, but it’s what God wants you todo.” She says that was the determining factor after a 1956 fire-bombing of her home where she and her first child were alone, that forged her initial fateful commitment to the civil rights cause led by her late husband, Martin Luther King.

Shaken directly by the danger of it, “I had to do some deep soul searching about my commitment to the struggle. I knew I would have to be as committed as my husband. ” Then and there, in earnest prayer, cradling her child outside their blasted bedroom, she made her commitment “prepared for whatever might take place.” ‘ “It ultimately did,” she adds of the 1968 assassination of King.

She and other women – including Supreme Court Justice Sandra O’CoMor – appeared on a panel at the recent Episcopal Church convention here, describing differing critical times in their lives when they say they found God’s guidance through prayer. Justice O’CoMor’s hour of decision came when the offer of the Supreme Court appointment came, the first ever to a woman. “It was like a ~underbolt,” she said.