How to start praying with your Husband: 6 Tips (Reader Q & A)

Ideas, tips, and tricks for how to start praying with your husband.

Let’s dig in to some reader mail and answer some of your burning questions, shall we?

Dear Elizabeth,
My husband and I are both cradle Catholics, and while before we got married we talked about how we wanted to grow our faith together, he always seems very reluctant to pray together or really do any spiritual activity together.
I’ve mentioned it to him and try to tell him about what I’m doing to be closer to God on my own, but I don’t know how to bring him into this with me.
When I do mention praying together, he just says ok…and I don’t know where to start but he is expecting me to lead him!
Prayer was a private thing in both our families.
Do you have any advice?
I feel like my marriage is severely lacking a foundation on faith.
Your Reader

Tips, tricks, and helps for how to start praying with your husband!

Dear Reader,

My heart goes out to you! You may have read my post on praying with my husband and I’m assuming this is what prompted your email.

All I have to offer you is my own experience.

Praying together can take time

First off, I want you to know that it took us nearly 8 years to pray together on a semi-consistent basis.

God was always something that drew us together, but our faith was very immature when we were first married.

About 4 years into marriage, I recommitted to knowing, loving, and serving God with my whole being. Husband’s recommitment came not long after mine, but for awhile, I felt that I was the only one trying to progress in my faith.

Even after Husband got serious about his relationship with the Lord, it took several years for him to become the spiritual leader of our family.

I used to mention praying together or asking if we could do more praying as a family (beyond meals and bedtime prayers with the kids). I always got a similar reaction from my husband as you get from yours now.

He seemed kind of lackluster but said “Alright.” Nothing usually happened as a result.

Many times he would ask me to lead, which is not what I was wanting from him. I was really wanting him to be the leader of our family.

That’s a long story to say “I’ve been there.”

However, the sooner we get over our awkwardness and create this habit, the better. So let’s tackle this a bit deeper.

There isn’t a formulaic answer to your question, but I will tell you what seemed to help our struggle with growing in faith together.

How to start praying with your husband: 6 Keys

1.Prayer

Prayer sounds like such a simplistic answer, but taking your troubles and desires to the Lord is where you need to start.

Ask Him to strengthen your husband’s faith and to help him be the spiritual leader of your family.

Prayer is mysterious but this is a prayer I believe God is happy to answer. We know that a spiritually strong family is His will and so we can ask this in complete confidence.

Knock down the doors of heaven (remember the parable of the widow who won’t leave the judge alone until he answers her?).

2.Stop asking

Quit asking your husband for spiritual leadership.

Has anyone ever suggested you do something and kept asking (maybe even nagging…not that I would know about nagging!).

Are you likely to do it?

Even if you initially felt drawn to it, don’t you feel a bit of pressure and annoyance from all the prodding?

I like to push back and not give in. I want it to be my idea.

When you want to ask your husband for spiritual leadership, instead offer your desire up to the Lord.

This doesn’t mean you can’t share your faith or what you are learning with him, but it is about how you present ideas and thoughts to him.

Live your faith and let your life be a witness to him.

When he is ready, he will know you are open to praying together or other forms of spiritual communion and growth.

6 ways to start praying together as a couple

3.Step down

I may get in some hot water here. I’m an encourager and stay away from hot button issues, but this just has to be said.

Just as the Lord asks us to submit to the authority of the Church, of our government, and of our superiors, He has also asked wives to submit to their husband.

(GASP!)

It isn’t about being a doormat, but it is about allowing him to lead.

He will never take the lead if you consistently fill the role.

If he does not fill the role of spiritual leader, you should not attempt to fill it yourself, it will only delay his taking on that God-given role.

This did not come natural to me nor was it my life’s experience. It had to be learned.

Ask God to free you from any patterns you may have picked up as a child or may have fallen into.

Understand how the media and Hollywood portrays men. They are often stupid baboons and the woman is always the level-headed leader of the family.

This paradigm has, unfortunately, affected the way our families function.

4. Holy Spirit

My husband had a powerful encounter with the Lord and with His Holy Spirit several years ago now. It became his “watershed moment” as a spiritual leader.

Shortly after, I began to notice a change in the way he served, led, and directed our family.

He went from being a good dad/husband to a GREAT dad/husband. (He isn’t perfect quite yet, gosh darn!- there is always more work for the Holy Spirit to do!)

I want to encourage you to pray the Lord will fill your Husband with His Spirit.

This is another prayer we can pray with 100% confidence. God is eager to do this in their lives.

5. Patience

The hardest part for me was patience.

I say a prayer and I expect God to answer it within a couple of weeks. If He can answer it by the next minute, all the better!

God’s timing is not our own. And can I just say, He is soooooo slow sometimes!

Give your concerns to God and let His promises bring you peace as you wait. Maybe even look for a scripture verse that you can meditate on whenever you are frustrated or discouraged.

“Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you.”
Jeremiah 29:12

“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
I Thessalonians 5:16-18

Guess what? There are still devotions I wish Husband would lead our family in, but they are devotions I am drawn to, not him.

So instead of nagging, I practice those devotions in my private prayer life and wait for God to lead my husband to them.

6.Support

When your husband is actually ready to step up and lead, be there to support him.

It is downright awkward at first when praying together (as a couple or family).

Many of us don’t have an example or experience of this growing up. When you do pray together, tell him thank you and let him know how much it meant to you.

If I want him to lead, I need to let him lead and encourage him along the way.

There will most likely be stops and starts along this awkward journey, but persevere in prayer and love.

7. Don’t compare!

Know too that prayers and devotions vary by family. Just because your prayers together don’t follow the exact formula of the Jones family doesn’t mean they aren’t just as beautiful.

I love the Rosary and know many families who choose to make it their family’s prayer.

But our family is different.

Husband loves scripture, so he often chooses to lead our prayer time with God’s Word. He draws out beautiful reflections and prayers from the Bible.

His devotion to God’s Word is just as valid and beautiful as the family who prays the Rosary.

He is leading our family in a different way and I’m more than okay with that.

8. Allow prayer to evolve

The way Husband and I pray together is ever changing.

Mostly we read scripture and then pray but in the last year we’ve also prayed Evening Prayer from the Magnificat together.

(Update: In 2021 we are doing a combination of listening to The Bible in a Year podcast and the prayer portion of Evening Prayer from the Magnificat. Our 13 year old has been joining us for this time together and it is a perfect way to end our day.)