Friday, September 4, 2020 –
Today we start on our little journey through each of the THREE EMINIENT GOOD WORKS. We begin with PRAYER (AKA ORATIO).
I think that many people have a difficult time understanding prayer—its purpose and its strength—because we are inundated with people screaming about flying spaghetti monsters and pachemamas, the sending of “good vibes” and positive air-hug thoughts (whatever those are) because they see prayer as “worthless,” and a general sense by people that God is some sort of magic, lottery winning genie who either grants your every wish or gets thrown in the dustbin.
Spoiler alert: NONE of these are true!
To have a thorough discussion about prayer, we really need to go into the different types of prayer: blessing and adoration, contrition, petition (supplication), intercession, thanksgiving, and praise. BUT…that is a whole other series! For this post, we will focus on what prayer is, generally speaking. We will also go over **WHY** prayer is important.
The Catechism defines prayer with a sentence from Saint John Damascene:
2590 “Prayer is the raising of one’s mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God” (St. John Damascene, De fide orth. 3, 24:PG 94, 1089C).
That is all fine and good, but I like a little more, easy-to-chew meat on my inquires! Well, as always, let’s crack open our Baltimore Catechism, which has a rather lengthy section on prayer that covers everything in the what, why, how, etc. realm of questions. I have pulled the most pertinent to our current discussion, but for those who want to read the whole lesson, feel free to pull up Lesson 28: On Prayer (HERE):
Q. 1098. Is there any other means of obtaining God’s grace than the Sacraments?
A. There is another means of obtaining God’s grace, and it is prayer.
Q. 1099. What is prayer?
A. Prayer is the lifting up of our minds and hearts to God, to adore Him, to thank Him for His benefits, to ask His forgiveness, and to beg of Him all the graces we need whether for soul or body.
Q. 1100. How many kinds of prayer are there?
A. There are two kinds of prayer:
1. Mental prayer, called meditation, in which we spend the time thinking of God or of one or more of the truths He has revealed, that by these thoughts we may be persuaded to lead holier lives;
2. Vocal prayer, in which we express these pious thoughts in words.
…
Q. 1104. Is prayer necessary to salvation?
A. Prayer is necessary to salvation, and without it no one having the use of reason can be saved.
…
Q. 1110. Why does God not always grant our prayers?
A. God does not always grant our prayers for these and other reasons:
1. Because we may not pray in the proper manner;
2. That we may learn our dependence on Him, prove our confidence in Him, and merit rewards by our patience and perseverance in prayer.
Prudent persons do not grant every request; why, then, should God do so?
Q. 1111. What assurance have we that God always hears and rewards our prayers, though He may not grant what we ask?
A. We have the assurance of Our Lord Himself that God always hears and rewards our prayers, though He may not grant what we ask; for Christ said: “Ask and it shall be given you,” and “if you ask the Father anything in My name, He will give it to you.”
…
Q. 1117. What are the fruits of prayer?
A. The fruits of prayer are:
1. It strengthens our faith,
2. nourishes our hope,
3. increases our love for God,
4. keeps us humble,
5. merits grace and atones for sin.
Q. 1118. Why should we pray when God knows our needs?
A. We pray not to remind God or tell Him of what we need, but to acknowledge that He is the Supreme Giver, to adore and worship Him by showing our entire dependence upon Him for every gift to soul or body.
Q. 1120. Did Our Lord Himself pray, and why?
A. Our Lord Himself very frequently prayed, often spending the whole night in prayer. He prayed before every important action, not that He needed to pray, but to set us an example of how and when we should pray. (Baltimore Catechism #3, Lesson 28: On Prayer)
I know that was a lot to take in, but it was worth it! Prayer fixes our hearts and minds on God, but it benefits US! And by “benefits us” I do NOT mean that God grants our nutty requests to find a billion dollars. Rather, our worthy prayer recognizes God as our Creator and strengthens us to do His Will and love Him more and more.
Remember, too, that Enid M. Chadwick, in My Book of the Church’s Year, depicted that prayer is “our weapon against the devil.” This is very much the case, and despite some recent Twitter kerfuffles about whether or not the Rosary is a weapon (Spoiler Alert: It IS!!), prayer **IS** our weapon against the devil. Because prayer fixes our hearts and minds on God, our Creator, we build up our spiritual “muscle” to resist the temptations from the evil one. Through prayer we obtain grace to live according to God’s will! And that, dear reader is an AWESOME thing!
Saint Lucy, pray for us!
