October Reflection!!!

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.”  He said to them, “When you pray, say: ‘Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation. [Luke 11: 1 – 4]

Hi beautiful daughters of God,

As we know, this month is our month of “PRAYER”.  As we are a group of praying ladies, this month is especially important to us and so we have a number of bullet points on different aspects of prayer to help us contemplate the idea of prayer and make any necessary changes to our prayer life.

 

Some of the sentences will challenge us to examine our lives, our previous ideas and conceptions, our families and our homes.  Pray for the light of the Holy Spirit to reveal to you what needs to be changed in your prayer life, your Christian life as well as in the life of your family.

Keep it, read it, meditate on it, refer back to it often and share it with family and friends.

Have an awesome time in God’s presence tomorrow night!

Stay blessed!

xxx

Reflection:

·         Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God

·         Prayer is the foundation of the spiritual edifice.  Prayer is all-powerful.

·         God tirelessly calls each person to this mysterious encounter with Himself. Prayer unfolds throughout the whole history of salvation as a reciprocal call between God and man.

·         You seek the company of friends, who with their conversation and affection, with their friendship, make the exile of this world more bearable for you.  There is nothing wrong with that, although friends sometimes let you down.  But how is it you don’t frequent daily, with greater intensity, the company, the conversation of the great Friend, who never lets you down?

·         You say that you don’t know how to pray? Put yourself in the presence of God and once you have said, “Lord, I don’t know how to pray!” rest assured that you have begun to do so.

·         You write: “to pray is to talk with God.  But about what?”  About what?  About Him, about yourself: joys, sorrows, successes, failures, noble ambitions, daily worries, weaknesses!  And acts of thanksgiving and petitions: and Love and reparation.  In a word: to get to know Him and to get to know yourself: “to get acquainted!”

·         The prayer of Abraham and Jacob is presented as a battle of faith marked by trust in God's faithfulness and by certitude in the victory promised to perseverance.

·         The prayer of Moses responds to the living God's initiative for the salvation of his people. It foreshadows the prayer of intercession of the unique mediator, Christ Jesus.

·         The prayer of the People of God flourished in the shadow of the dwelling place of God's presence on earth, the Ark of the Covenant and the Temple, under the guidance of their shepherds, especially King David, and of the prophets.

·         “He spent the whole night in prayer to God,” Apostle Luke tells of Our Lord.  And you?  How often have you persevered like that?  Well, then….

·         Slowly.  Consider what you are saying, to whom it is being said and by whom.  For that hurried talk, without time for reflection is noise, empty clatter.

·         If you don’t keep in touch with Christ in prayer and in the Bread, how can you make Him known to others?

·         If you are not a woman of prayer, I don’t believe in the sincerity of your intentions when you say that you work for Christ.

·         “Not by bread alone does every man live, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God”, said our Lord.  Bread and word!  Communion – Eucharist and Prayer.  Otherwise, you will not live a supernatural life.

·         The prophets summoned the people to conversion of heart and, while zealously seeking the face of God, like Elijah, they interceded for the people.

·         It is Jesus who speaks: “Amen, I say to you: ask and you shall receive; seek and you shall find; knock and it shall be opened to you.”  Pray.  In what human venture could you have grater guarantees of success?

·         Persevere in prayer.  Persevere, even when your efforts seem barren.  Prayer is ALWAYS fruitful.

·         The Psalms constitute the masterwork of prayer in the Old Testament. They present two inseparable qualities: the personal, and the communal. They extend to all dimensions of history, recalling God's promises already fulfilled and looking for the coming of the Messiah.

·         Prayed and fulfilled in Christ, the Psalms are an essential and permanent element of the prayer of the Church. They are suitable for men of every condition and time.

·         Jesus' filial prayer is the perfect model of prayer in the New Testament. Often done in solitude and in secret, the prayer of Jesus involves a loving adherence to the will of the Father even to the Cross and an absolute confidence in being heard.

·         In his teaching, Jesus teaches his disciples to pray with a purified heart, with lively and persevering faith, with filial boldness. He calls them to vigilance and invites them to present their petitions to God in his name. Jesus Christ himself answers prayers addressed to him.

·         The prayers of the Virgin Mary, in her “Be it done unto me according to thy Word” and in Luke 1: 46 - 55, are characterized by the generous offering of her whole being in faith.

·         “Mary chose the better part”, we read in the holy Gospel.  There she is, drinking in the words of the Master.  Apparently idle, she is praying and loving,  Then she accompanies Jesus in his preaching through towns and villages,  Without prayer, how difficult it is to accompany Him!

·         The Holy Spirit who teaches the Church and recalls to her all that Jesus said also instructs her in the life of prayer, inspiring new expressions of the same basic forms of prayer: blessing, petition, intercession, thanksgiving, and praise.

·         Because God blesses the human heart, it can in return bless him who is the source of every blessing.

·         Forgiveness, the quest for the Kingdom, and every true need are objects of the prayer of petition.

·         Prayer of intercession consists in asking on behalf of another. It knows no boundaries and extends to one's enemies.

·         2Every joy and suffering, every event and need can become the matter for thanksgiving which, sharing in that of Christ, should fill one's whole life: "Give thanks in all circumstances" (1 Thess 5:18).

·         Prayer of praise is entirely without prejudice and rises to God, lauds him, and gives him glory for his own sake, quite beyond what he has done, but simply because HE IS.

·         By a living transmission -Tradition - the Holy Spirit in the Church teaches the children of God to pray.

·         The Word of God, the liturgy of the Church, and the virtues of faith, hope, and charity are sources of prayer.

·         Prayer is primarily addressed to the Father; it can also be directed toward Jesus, particularly by the invocation of his holy name: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners."

·         "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord', except by the Holy Spirit" (⇒ 1 Cor 12:3). the Church invites us to invoke the Holy Spirit as the interior Teacher of Christian prayer.

·         The different schools of Christian spirituality share in the living tradition of prayer and are precious guides for the spiritual life.

·         The Christian family is the first place for education in prayer.

·         Ordained ministers, the consecrated life, catechesis, prayer groups, and "spiritual direction" ensure assistance within the Church in the practice of prayer.

·         The Christian tradition comprises three major expressions of the life of prayer: vocal prayer, meditation, and contemplative prayer. They have in common the recollection of the heart.

·         Vocal prayer, founded on the union of body and soul in human nature, associates the body with the interior prayer of the heart, following Christ's example of praying to his Father and teaching the Our Father to his disciples.

·         Meditation is a prayerful quest engaging thought, imagination, emotion, and desire. Its goal is to make our own in faith the subject considered, by confronting it with the reality of our own life.

·         Contemplative prayer is the simple expression of the mystery of prayer. It is a gaze of faith fixed on Jesus, attentiveness to the Word of God, a silent love. It achieves real union with the prayer of Christ to the extent that it makes us share in his mystery.

·         Prayer presupposes an effort, a fight against ourselves and the wiles of the Tempter. The battle of prayer is inseparable from the necessary "spiritual battle" to act habitually according to the Spirit of Christ: we pray as we live, because we live as we pray.

·         In the battle of prayer we must confront erroneous conceptions of prayer, various currents of thought, and our own experience of failure. We must respond with humility, trust, and perseverance to these temptations which cast doubt on the usefulness or even the possibility of prayer.

·         The principal difficulties in the practice of prayer are distraction and dryness. The remedy lies in faith, conversion, and vigilance of heart.

·         Two frequent temptations threaten prayer: lack of faith and acedia - a form of depression stemming from lax ascetical practice that leads to discouragement.

·         Filial trust is put to the test when we feel that our prayer is not always heard. The Gospel invites us to ask ourselves about the conformity of our prayer to the desire of the Spirit.

·         "Pray constantly" (⇒ 1 Thess 5:17). It is always possible to pray. It is even a vital necessity. Prayer and Christian life are inseparable.

·         The prayer of the hour of Jesus, rightly called the "priestly prayer" ( Jn 17), sums up the whole economy of creation and salvation. It fulfills the great petitions of the Our Father.

·         In response to his disciples' request "Lord, teach us to pray" (Lk 11:1), Jesus entrusts them with the fundamental Christian prayer, the Our Father.

·         "The Lord's Prayer is truly the summary of the whole gospel," The "most perfect of prayers." It is at the center of the Scriptures.

·         It is called "the Lord's Prayer" because it comes to us from the Lord Jesus, the master and model of our prayer.

·         Simple and faithful trust, humble and joyous assurance are the proper dispositions for one who prays the Our Father.

·         We can invoke God as "Father" because the Son of God made man has revealed him to us. Jn this Son, through Baptism, we are incorporated and adopted as sons of God.

·         The Lord's Prayer brings us into communion with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. At the same time it reveals us to ourselves.

·         Praying to our Father should develop in us the will to become like him and foster in us a humble and trusting heart.

·         When we say "Our" Father, we are invoking the new covenant in Jesus Christ, communion with the Holy Trinity, and the divine love which spreads through the Church to encompass the world.

·         "Who art in heaven" does not refer to a place but to God's majesty and his presence in the hearts of the just. Heaven, the Father's house, is the true homeland toward which we are heading and to which, already, we belong.

·         In the Our Father, the object of the first three petitions is the glory of the Father: the sanctification of his name, the coming of the kingdom, and the fulfillment of his will. the four others present our wants to him: they ask that our lives be nourished, healed of sin, and made victorious in the struggle of good over evil.

·         By asking "hallowed be thy name" we enter into God's plan, the sanctification of his name - revealed first to Moses and then in Jesus - by us and in us, in every nation and in each man.

·         By the second petition, the Church looks first to Christ's return and the final coming of the Reign of God. It also prays for the growth of the Kingdom of God in the "today" of our own lives.

·         In the third petition, we ask our Father to unite our will to that of his Son, so as to fulfill his plan of salvation in the life of the world.

·         In the fourth petition, by saying "give us," we express in communion with our brethren our filial trust in our heavenly Father. "Our daily bread" refers to the earthly nourishment necessary to everyone for subsistence, and also to the Bread of Life: the Word of God and the Body of Christ. It is received in God's "today," as the indispensable, (super - ) essential nourishment of the feast of the coming Kingdom anticipated in the Eucharist.

·         The fifth petition begs God's mercy for our offences, mercy which can penetrate our hearts only if we have learned to forgive our enemies, with the example and help of Christ.

·         When we say "lead us not into temptation" we are asking God not to allow us to take the path that leads to sin. This petition implores the Spirit of discernment and strength; it requests the grace of vigilance and final perseverance.

·         In the last petition, "but deliver us from evil," Christians pray to God with the Church to show forth the victory, already won by Christ, over the "ruler of this world," Satan, the angel personally opposed to God and to his plan of salvation.

·         By the final "Amen," we express our "agreement" concerning the seven petitions: "So be it".