Gospel of Luke, chapter 11:13

Today’s Scripture reading offers an important insight into the meaning of prayer in our lives. When Jesus calls us to pray in today’s Gospel, He encourages us to ask for the Holy Spirit.  Praying with this awareness guarantees that we’ll pray only for what’s best for us, not to do our own will but God’s will. Persevering in prayer, therefore, is not our attempt to wrangle favors from God but rather our determination to live good lives as Jesus taught us.  Prayer has nothing to do with obtaining favors from God that satisfy selfish needs. It has everything to do, however, with stretching our aspirations to the measure of God’s love for us through His holy spirit. We can only pray through the Holy Spirit who frees us from the limitations and selfishness of the human spirit.

If we ever had doubts that prayer means engaging in a dialogue with God, today’s scripture dispels them.  We are reminded that prayer is a conversation with God who imparts the Holy Spirit to us to help us when we ask Him.

In the Gospel, Luke 11:1-4, Jesus recognizes that we may not be able to appreciate what to ask for, so He teaches us how to pray; He puts the words into our mouths. In The Lord’s Prayer, He demonstrates how bold we may be in prayer by addressing God as Father. He also establishes the proper attitude or disposition for prayer; namely, to set our hearts on God’s Kingdom. At the same time, Jesus shows us what our prayer will accomplish; namely, the sanctification of God’s name, the doing of God’s will, the forgiveness of sins and the avoidance of temptation.

Whenever you pray the Lord’s Prayer, do so slowly; meditate on each and every petition by taking it to heart. Recall the words of Jesus: “when you pray, do not rattle on like pagans, thinking you will gain a hearing through the multiplication of words.” Let your prayer be a meditation on the words of scripture, and ask the Holy Spirit to open your mind and heart to understand them better and put them into practice.

Fr. Hugh Duffy

* * * Don’t miss tomorrow’s blog on Holy Spirit * * *