Good morning. In today’s Gospel, Jesus gives us the perfect prayer - the “Our Father” or the “Lord’s Prayer”. We know this prayer by heart because we pray it at every Mass, every time we pray the Holy Rosary, and, for those of us who pray the Liturgy of the Hours, with Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. When we pray the Our Father prayer, we come to realize that our God is “a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger, rich in clemency, loath to punish,” as Jonah so eloquently put it in today’s first reading.
In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray for forgiveness and reconciliation of differences with one another, especially our loved one. We pray for persistence in prayer. We pray that God nourishes us every day with His living word in Sacred Scriptures and the Eucharist because, we profess what Peter confessed: “[My Lord and my God], to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus invites us into an intimate relationship with our Father in heaven, our Creator, the Author of our life who breathes his Spirit into us and sustains us with His love, mercy, and grace. This is “a radically new way of approaching God, and reveals what Jesus uniquely offers us: a completely new identity as children of God, wherein we can come to know him more intimately than we ever thought possible” (Michael Stevens).
Bishop Robert Barron wrote that “prayer is intimate communion and conversation with God. Judging from Jesus’ own life, prayer is something that we ought to do often, especially at key moments in our lives.” In my “The Word on Fire Bible: The Gospel,” there is a picture of an etching by Rembrandt of King David in prayer. The piece shows David “in prayer, kneeling at the side of his bed. The scene is so personal and informal. . . as if David were interrupting his normal routine to take a moment before the Lord” (Michael Stevens).
My sisters and brothers in Christ, our prayer time can be communal and formal like here at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Our prayer time can also be personal and informal like when we “go to [our] inner room, close the door, and pray to [our] Father” in sacred silence (Matthew 6:6). How many times in the Gospel did Jesus go away to a quiet place to pray and spend in sacred silence with his heavenly Father? Let us pray daily and “[rejoice] always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
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