The Brooklyn Tabernacle, a 3,500-seat evangelical prayer palace in
downtown Brooklyn, was built in 1918 as one of the largest and grandest
vaudeville houses in North America. It is still a hot ticket. Its
youngish, racially diverse congregation packs the pews each week to
praise God and bask in the sounds of a Grammy-winning 250-voice gospel
choir. But the tabernacle is more than just a popular church. It is
also a destination for evangelicals from all around the United States
and beyond, laymen and ministers alike, who come as acolytes to study
prayer.
"Prayer is like other activities," the Rev. Daniel Henderson told me
when we met at the tabernacle the week before Easter. He was visiting
Brooklyn with a group of seminary students from Virginia. "You learn
from people who are already good at it," he went on. "The people who
pray at the Brooklyn Tabernacle are committed. Praying with them is an
education."
The Right Way to Pray?
