Word to the Wise
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 - Wednesday in the 30th Week in Ordinary Time
[Rom 8:26-30 and Luke 13:22-30,]The Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes with inexpressible groanings. And the one who searches hearts knows what is the intention of the Spirit, because he intercedes for the holy ones according to God's will.
On retreats, I will usually present a conference on PRAYER. I have found it useful to distinguish between the PRAY(ER), which is you or me, and PRAYER(S) which is the expression we give to our relationship with God. I put a plus mark between these two words and a = sign after them with the word PRAYER? at the end. The reason for this is the question that many people have in regard to "prayer:" What am I doing? Is this worthwhile? Does God really "hear" my PRAYER(S)?
The words of St. Paul in today's first scripture insures us that God indeed "hears" our prayer(s) because it is the Spirit that prays with us. In other words, God prays with us whenever we pray! We tend to think that we pray TO God and not WITH God. But prayer is the expression of our relationship with God and I think we deny ourselves an important spiritual resource when we give too great an emphasis to the words or expressions that we use, thinking that certain formulas are more effective than others. PRAYER(S) are not magical encantations! We should say whatever we want to say to God and let the Spirit shape our attempts. Yes, we do have certain prayers that have come down to us in the Word of God, such as the Psalms or the Our Father. Yes, these have the authority of scripture and the Lord's own expression. But they too are meant to be expressions of our relationship with God and when we use them the Spirit also shapes them. In short, I do not believe we can ever say, "I don't know how to pray!" AMEN