By Randall Smith, The Catholic Thing - I’ve written about priests who, when asked for a prayer, did not pray to God, but merely asked everyone to “be mindful” of something, as for example: “Let’s be mindful of the poor,” or “Let’s be mindful of those suffering from the earthquake.” I suggested, perhaps somewhat unkindly, that this was a kind of hypocrisy... “Hypocrite” comes from a Greek word meaning “actor.” A “hypocrite” is pretending to be something he is not, the way an actor pretends to be someone (Hamlet, Henry V, or a cowardly lion) he is not. “Being mindful” is not a prayer, and one should not play-act as though it is.