“This is how you are to pray:
Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name,
thy Kingdom come,
Preparing to obey the Lord’s command, we should consider what happens when we pray. Prayer begins in the heart as we respond to God’s presence. It flows to the mind and the lungs. In the mind it collects the words of prayer; in the lungs it amasses the wind. The separated rivulets meet again in the vocal cords and mouth with its tongue, teeth and cheeks to sound audible words. There they meet another powerful stream of emotion from the heart.
I said the mind contributed words to the flow of prayer but where did the mind get them? Ah, there is another deep consideration. For many Catholics their source is memory; we learned the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be, Act of Contrition, and many other prayers as children. We also learned to sign ourselves with the Cross, strike our chests, and genuflect as children. These prayers and gestures have a history which began a long ago.
The words and phrases of prayer, of course, have their own historical roots. Some like Amen and Halleluiah came to us from Hebrew; and Christ, a translation of the Hebrew Messiah from Greek. When we turn to The Lord’s Prayer, we realize that Jesus wanted his gentile disciples to know and embrace the Jewish tradition of prayer. He received that tradition from his mother Mary, Joseph, and his ancestors; he modified it with his own genius; and passed it along to us. As Saint Paul would later write to the Corinthians, “For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you,” and “For I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received….”
As an heir of two thousand years of prayers composed by so many saints of holiness and genius, I feel no particular need to create my own original prayer every time I turn to the Lord.
When we decide to pray, we wade into an ancient river of grace and are swept along in its life-giving stream. That river is God the Holy Spirit who breathes and sounds in us, appealing to God the Father in the name of Jesus Christ for our salvation.
Saint Francis described our life of prayer with a wonderful antiphon of the Blessed Mother. She is daughter of the most high Heavenly Father, mother of our Savior Jesus Christ, and spouse of the Holy Spirit. As we breathe the sacred words of Jesus, we are enfolded in the Holy Trinity with the Virgin and animated by the life of God.
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I love to write. This blog helps me to meditate on the Word of God, and I hope to make some contribution to our contemplations of God's Mighty Works.
Ordinarily, I write these reflections two or three weeks in advance of their publication. I do not intend to comment on current events.
I understand many people prefer gender-neutral references to "God." I don't disagree with them but find that language impersonal, unappealing and tasteless. When I refer to "God" I think of the One whom Jesus called "Abba" and "Father", and I would not attempt to improve on Jesus' language.
You're welcome to add a thought or raise a question.