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Lent 2012

In the biblical accounts of the earthly life of Jesus we discover the way in which He lived in a continual communion with the Father. They are meant to teach us the way of prayer. Here are but a few snippets of many passages in the Gospels;  

After all the people had been baptized and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, heaven was opened (Luke 3:21);  

He was praying in a certain place, and when he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, "Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples." He said to them, "When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. (Luke 11: 1-3);  

In those days he departed to the mountain to pray, and he spent the night in prayer to God. When day came, he called his disciples to himself, and from them he chose Twelve, whom he also named apostles: (Luke 6:12-13);  

About eight days after he said this, he took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray. While he was praying his face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white." (Luke 9:28-29) 

Jesus was a man of prayer. We often think that He prayed the way He did only "because He was Divine." However, in his sacred humanity he reveals the fullness of our own humanity, as redeemed and recreated in Him. The Fathers of the 2nd Vatican Council reminded us of this: 

"The truth is that only in the mystery of the Incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light. For Adam, the first man, was a figure of Him Who was to come, namely Christ the Lord. Christ, the final Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear."  

In Jesus, we find a new way of being human, beginning right now. He Himself is the Way, the Truth and the Life. (Jn. 14:16) By His Incarnation - His Saving Life, Death, Resurrection and Ascension- we are capacitated by grace to live differently. We can become what spiritual writers have long called "sons and daughters in the Son."

The prayer of Jesus opened the heavens, brought provision to the hungry, gave Him clarity for making decisions and brought the glory of heaven to earth and earth to heaven. Prayer still does all of this, and more, for all who will learn how to live their lives immersed in God as He did.

Through prayer we recover the capacity for a communion of love with the living God and learn how to plunge ourselves into its embrace. Through prayer we cry out with Jesus, "Abba Father." No longer alienated from God, we participate in the inner life of God. God dwells in us and we dwell in Him through His Spirit. This is prayer. It is not so much about doing or getting but rather about being, receiving, giving, and loving.  

Through prayer, daily life takes on a new meaning. It becomes a classroom of communion. In that classroom we learn the truth about who we are - and who we are becoming - in Jesus. Through prayer we receive new glasses through which we see the true landscape of life and find the way to walk.  

Through prayer darkness is dispelled and the path of true progress is illuminated. Through prayer we begin to understand why this kind of communion seems so elusive at times. Because of sin, we struggle with our own disordered appetites, and live in a manner at odds with the beauty and order of the creation within which we dwell. Then, through prayer, we find the way to freedom from the effects of sin and a new beginning. We learn to live as penitents, eagerly confessing our sin and regularly returning to our first love.

Prayer opens us to Revelation, expands our capacity to comprehend truth and equips us to change, through conversion. Through prayer we are drawn into a deepening relationship with Jesus, whose loving embrace on the hill of Golgotha bridged heaven and earth.  His relationship with His Father is opened now to us. The same Spirit that raised Him from the dead begins to give us new life as we are converted, transfigured and made new.  

Through prayer, heavenly wisdom is planted in the field of our hearts. We experience communion with the Trinitarian God. We become, in the words of the Apostle Peter "partakers of the divine nature." (2 Peter 1:4) That participation will only be fully complete when we are with Him in the fullness of His embrace, in Resurrected Bodies in a New Heaven and a New Earth, but it begins now, in the grace of this present moment. 

Christian prayer does not always bring consolation, at least at the affective or emotional level. However, it does always bring an increase in this communion. It is there where we find every answer, by living in God. In prayer we learn to crawl into the wounded side of the Savior and find our home next to His Sacred Heart.

 

National Church Office
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©2012