Weekly HOMILY for July 29, 2007: How to Pray

17th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C
Our Lady of Grace

How to Pray
By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato
July 29, 2007


One Prayer

There is a story about an eight-year-old boy named Benjamin.

Benjamin really wanted a baby sister and he decided to write a prayer-letter to God. And this is what he wrote.

“Dear God, I’ve been a very good boy…” And then, Benjamin stopped, thinking that God would not be convinced by this argument.

And so, he began again: “Dear God, most of the time I’ve been good…” And again, Benjamin stopped, thinking that this just wasn’t strong enough.

After a few moments, Benjamin got up, took a towel out of the linen closet and spread it on a chair in the living room. Then, he walked over to the mantle above the fireplace and slowly lifted down the statue of Mary.

Very carefully, Benjamin placed the statue of Mary on the towel and wrapped it. He then carried it back to the dining room table and began his third attempt at writing his prayer-letter.

This time, he wrote: “Dear God, if you ever want to see your mother again…”


How to Pray

Obviously, little Benjamin really struggled with how to pray to God.

In today’s Gospel, the disciples ask Jesus: “Lord, teach us to pray.” This afternoon, I want to reflect with you on just the first two words of the prayer that Jesus teaches, the words “Our” and “Father.”

Theses words are rich in meaning and they guide us in how we are to pray.


“Father”

I start with the word “Father.”

In my ministry, I have heard some people say that it is difficult to pray to God as “Father.” They say this because their own father was either absent or not a good example.

Well, when Jesus teaches us to pray to God as “Father,” he is not projecting an earthly image of fatherhood onto God. Instead, he is doing the reverse – showing us from God what an earthly father and all of us are to be like.

When we pray to God as “Father,” we recognize God as the One who transcends and is beyond anything we can know or imagine. We are also recognizing God as our Creator, as the One who gives life to everything that is.

We recognize God as the divine source from which we all come and the divine goal to which we all will return. And then, in addition to the gift of our life, the word “Father” conveys that God is the source of all good.

After teaching this prayer, Jesus uses the comparison of an earthly father. He says that if we “give good things to our children, how much more will the Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

The idea here is that the gift of God is God himself. How often we say that it is important for parents not just to give things to their children, but to be there for them, to give themselves to their children!

Here Jesus is saying that God as “Father” is the model for this. He gives us the gift of himself and in fact, this is what prayer is all about – opening ourselves to receive this gift from God.

All of this is wrapped up in the one word “Father.”


“Our”

And then, there is the word “Our.”

In a sense, only Jesus is fully entitled to say “My Father.” As we say in our Creed, Jesus alone is “eternally begotten of the Father, God from God.”

The rest of us speak of God as “Our Father” because the rest of us have become God’s children in and through Jesus. And, unlike Jesus, we are not ready-made children of God.

We have to grow to become more and more God’s sons and daughters. We do this through prayer.

In our prayer, we grow in our inner relationship and communion with the “Father.” And we also do this by our oneness with each other.

This is the other meaning of the word “Our.” In praying “Our Father,” we recognize our relatedness or connection with one another.

We are also to live with this awareness. We are to live as part of God’s family in the Church and with care for all of God’s children, whether they are in or outside of the Church.

All of this is wrapped up in the one word “Our.”


Conclusion

So, Jesus teaches us to pray “Our Father.”

Those two words express a great deal about God, about us, about our relationship with God and about our relationship with one another.

They are the foundation for how we are to pray at all times.