Praying from the cross

Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger

The issue is not whether we trust the power of prayer; it’s if we trust the power of God! How often do we hear that you have to “pray hard.” As if the harder we try to pray, the more likely our prayers will be heard. Yet isn’t that putting the shoe on the wrong foot? Is prayer really something that we do to get God’s attention, so to speak, as if God doesn’t already know exactly what we need? 

I am sure that you are not hearing this for the first time. We have all been reminded that we have to “let go and let God,” that prayer is more about letting God into our lives to lift us up than struggling to storm the gates of heaven with a lot of words, litanies and incantations. I have heard prayer described as “wasting time with God.” If we are honest, although many of us are quite “busy,” how much of the time we spend worrying, fretting and trying to keep ourselves occupied is really time all that well spent? 

Jesus certainly spent much of his time in prayer — and as he is God no less! Why does God need to talk to himself? Well, we know from our faith that God is a trinity of persons. Jesus prays to the Father in the Holy Spirit. This is the eternal rhythm of prayer that Jesus invites us into when he gives us the “Our Father” as a model for our prayer. Every time we make the Sign of the Cross we fold ourselves into that ongoing prayer in which Jesus is always engaged. Jesus wants to include us in his prayer, something that we get an intimate glimpse of in his “Priestly Prayer” of Chapter 17 of St. John’s Gospel. 

If we search the Scriptures we learn that Jesus is always praying or looking for a chance to pray. I have a kind of fantasy that Jesus must have built himself a raft at times and taken himself out on the Sea of Galilee just to be alone peacefully with his Heavenly Father. We are told he often “went up to the mountain” to pray. Nowhere, however, does Jesus seem to be more wrapt in prayer than on his cross. Every word that comes out of his mouth is a prayer, a plea for God to show mercy.

Sister Benedicta of the Cross — formerly Edith Stein — whose feast we celebrated recently (Aug. 9), came to the realization that our prayer is never more effective than when it comes from the cross of our own sufferings. Why? Because in suffering we empty ourselves of our self and open our hearts to be filled completely with the grace and mercy that comes from God alone. It is an admission of our powerlessness, our lack of control, that our lives are not ours alone, but meant to be shared, poured out for love of others. This is the meaning of the spiritual and corporal works of mercy which invite us to spend ourselves on others. In our poverty we experience that richness of the power of self sacrifice, uniting ourselves with Christ himself who poured out his life for us all on the cross.

Instead of trusting so much in the ritual of our prayers we rely solely on the power of God’s grace. When the Apostles found themselves roiling in a sudden storm that came up on the Sea of Galilee, they were suddenly confronted with an image on the water that they took at first to be a ghost. It was Jesus walking on the sea. We know the story of how Peter, in an impulsive moment, cried out to Jesus to give him the power to do the same.

Like the other Apostles, Peter had witnessed the power of Christ’s words and commands and may have thought of Jesus as something of a magician who could teach tricks and dole out magical powers. What he seems to have been lacking is faith in Jesus himself. For he quickly loses his confidence when he takes his eyes off of Jesus and starts to notice the spray and the wind and the waves around him. 

Our prayers are not prayers when the focus is on ourselves only. The more we allow God to draw us out of our own preoccupations and lead us away from the temptations and distractions, the more room we have in our hearts for God to pour grace into them. Jesus often uses examples from nature to describe the pruning and chastening effects of the good harvester’s grace.

The parable of the vine and the vine dresser perhaps best illustrates the seemingly painful process by which the vine must be trimmed of its dead and useless branches. If the vine could talk it might say, “ouch.” Yet the vine dresser is never closer to the vine than when it is being pruned. 

God’s action is not always so aggressive. We know how that good harvester may wait while the wheat and the chaff grow together, lest the good grain be pulled out with the bad. It is painful sometimes to watch evil flourish and seem at times to overtake the good. Certainly, the cross itself appeared to be an overwhelming defense. And Mary was there to behold the worst humiliation and defeat of innocence that ever happened. Yet she does not fall into the temptation of despair and hatred, her own heart being pierced by the spear of her Son’s suffering.

When we become discouraged by the way the world seems to be going, with so much violence and evil around us — one thinks of the slaughter of Christians in Africa, for example, which nobody wants to talk about — we might look to the Mother of Jesus, whom he himself gives to us, as the model of true compassion who embraces all those who suffer violence and injustice, who heard her Son say, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Another prayer from the Cross! May we never make the assumption that prayer is about feeling good about ourselves or particularly holy and at peace. Prayer that is a cry from a wounded heart is clearly one that most emulates that of Jesus himself. It also reminds us how close God is to those who suffer. Indeed, as Psalm 34 says, “the Lord hears the cry of the poor.”