Word to the Wise
Saturday, November 16, 2024 - Saturday in the 32th Week in Ordinary Time
[3 John 5-8 and Luke 18:1-8]Jesus told his disciples a parable about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary.....[Luke]
The parable in question is about a widow who nags a corrupt judge until she gets a just judgment. The judge finally gives her a just judgment because of her persistence. The idea is that if a corrupt judge responds to a righteous cause because of persistence, will not the righteous judge of all humankind respond to the prayers of his faithful ones? Persistence and perseverance are important when it comes to prayer. St. Paul in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-17 exhorts us to "pray without ceasing,"
An experience from my early days as a Dominican student brother (seminarian) has stayed in my memory. There was a Syrian Orthodox priest who was studying philosophy with us at our House of Studies in River Forest, IL. I noticed one day that he had a beaded bracelet on one of his wrists. When I asked him about it, he replied that it was a prayer bracelet, worn in accord with St. Paul's exhortation to "pray without ceasing."
The monastery of cloistered Dominican nuns that I serve as chaplain follows a regular schedule of the Liturgy of the Hours but each sister also takes a regularly scheduled time of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. A routine of that kind serves as a physical guarantee but what is essential is the "attitude of prayer" so that one's life becomes a prayer. Conscious "attentiveness" of the kind the spiritual writer Simone Weil recommends is an important element. Yes, it means we can "nag" God by our lives. It is not simply prayer for a particular outcome but prayer in confidence that God is listening and that, as Julian of Norwich said, "all will be well." AMEN