April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
REFLECTION
Prayer, part I: how to pray
An absolutely essential thing for us as Christians is prayer or praying.
"Prayer" is certainly about prayers we know and praying them, but it's just as much about being a prayerful person. Prayer is also an essential part of being human, as important as other basic human things such as breathing or eating. After all, we are made in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26), so we are spiritual beings, hard-wired for prayer. If we do not pray, we will slowly wither and die in heart and soul.
Remember that the Scriptures often speak of Jesus praying, whether He goes off to some quiet place or prays before a miracle (such as the feeding of the 5,000 or the raising of Lazarus from the dead) or a key event (such as in the Garden of Gethsemane, before His passion and death).
Yet, prayer can be difficult. Even in the Gospels, the disciples ask Jesus, "Lord, teach us to pray" (Luke 11:1). In response, Jesus gives them a prayer: the "Our Father."
That's a prayer in itself, of course, but it can also serve as the pattern for what and how we should pray. Remember, the disciples asked Jesus not so much what to pray for, but how should they pray!
The Our Father is really a series of statements and petitions. We begin by giving praise and honor to God, who is in heaven and whose name is holy, and we ask that God's will be done. After that, we make petitions for ourselves and our community. This is our basic model for how to pray.
The Our Father is not just a prayer for individuals. We do not say "my Father," but "our Father;" and we constantly say "us," not "me": "Give us this day;" "forgive us our trespasses." When we pray, we never do so alone, but as members of a community, the body of Christ.
Even if we are sitting alone, we are still praying as a member of a huge body of people that spans time and place. This thought has sustained many of our Christian brothers and sisters as they have spent years in isolation in prison simply for being Christian, or have struggled with the isolation that sickness can bring.
In 1975, Cardinal Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan was arrested and spent 13 years in prison - nine of them in solitary confinement in Vietnam. In his book, "Five Loaves and Two Fish," he often speaks of the sense that he was not alone, joined as he was with Christ and the Church community through prayer.
The idea of community is also seen in a more formal way when we pray the intercessions or "the prayer of the faithful" at Mass.
The "us" aspect of prayer means that everyone can pray. St. Francis de Sales remarked that there should be no person who writes him- or herself off as not able to pray: "So long as they are capable of grace, they are capable of prayer."
He goes on to say that "it is only the devil who is incapable of prayer, because he alone is incapable of love." No excuses, then!
It is true that sometimes prayer can seem very hard or even impossible, because we are experiencing a spiritual dryness due to illness, a crisis in our lives or just because. Even then, we can pray simply by offering in prayer our inability at that time to pray (a suggestion borrowed from a small book of prayer for cancer patients called "The Pink Book of Prayer").
So, Jesus has given us a pattern for how we can pray, and prayer is something we all can share: There are no outsiders or "lone rangers" when it comes to prayer.
If you have managed to get to the end of this article (well done!), why not spend a few moments in prayer, asking the Holy Spirit to help you grow as a person of prayer?
(Father Barratt is pastor of St. Ambrose parish in Latham. He holds a doctorate in theology and was a professor at St. John's Seminary in England before coming to the U.S. in 2004.)[[In-content Ad]]
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