Word to the Wise
Thursday, June 18, 2020 - Thursday in the 11th Week in Ordinary Time
[Sir 48:1-14 and Matt 6:7-15,44]"In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This is how you are to pray: 'Our Father who art n heaven, hallowed be thy name, they Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.' If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions." [Matthew]
I have printed out the entire gospel passage for today because it is easy to let some of it go right past us because of the words of the Lord's Prayer, which are so familiar to us - which is a problem in itself. What comes immediately before that prayer and after it are very important.
First of all, Jesus warns against elaborate and profuse prayers that are the product of an attitude that says, "the more, the better," when praying. The incredible amount of devotional prayer in Catholic tradition seems to leave Jesus' admonition in the dust. It also makes the prayer he teaches us seem like just one among many. We add "an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be..". to just about everything! A recovery of the power of the prayer taught by Jesus could do our devotional life a lot of good and clear away a lot of unnecessary words!
Second, the English translation of the Greek text cannot capture the urgency of Jesus' prayer because we lack a verb tense that Greek has, called "aorist." This carries with it the idea of "right now" and not pie in the sky, by and by. We can get lost in the familiarity of Jesus' prayer and ignore the actual words and petitions which place us in complete dependence on God's providence and mercy. Pope Francis recently caused a stir because he called attention to the line "and lead us not into temptation" and made it clear that God does not lead anyone into temptation. The petition is a prayer for protection and guidance and not to ask God to avoid doing something!!
Third, the petition for forgiveness is reinforced by the words that follow the prayer. If we expect forgiveness of our sins by God, we must also forgive our neighbor their transgressions against us. This should remind us that the Sacrament of Reconciliation is just the beginning of the process. We receive God's forgiveness there, but it requires a further action on our part - that we forgive others!!
We pray the words Jesus has given us thousands of times, but that repetition can numb us to the strength of Jesus' words which we make our own. It must not be just one prayer among thousands. It is THE prayer of a Christian. AMEN
config
view
logs
3840.0 KB
96 ms
4
