Keep Praying!

Prayer is a powerful antidote to evil. Saint James proposes it as the occupation of the person of faith, no matter what the circumstances. He seems to be echoing the sentiments that the apostle to the Gentiles wrote the church at Thessalonica, “Never stop praying” (1 Thes. 5:17). If you are suffering – keep praying. If you are in good spirits – keep praying. If you are sick -- keep praying. If you have sinned – keep praying. If you know someone who has strayed from the truth – keep praying. The believer is to pray with the tenacity of a child who knows his Father’s love for him. When we pray, we do not look to our worthiness or merit. No, we trust in God’s gracious kindness and mercy that has made us His own. Recall these words spoke through the Prophet Isaiah, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are mine: (Is. 43:1).

God’s favor and mercy are extended to all those He has made His own in the blood of His Son. Because He has redeemed us, we are precious in his sight. Because we are His children, He calls us to come to Him in faith and confidence. We believe that we have been baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire. When we pray, we are to remember the fascination we had as children when we played with fire. Jesus said as much : “Let the children [within you] come to me; do not prevent them” (Mk. 10:14). Jesus told us that we need to change our attitude: “I assure you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enjoy the blessings of the kingdom of heaven” (Mat. 18:3).

Despite the fact that we often forget we are God’s Children, God never forgets that He is out Father.
We have to rediscover the joy of our youth when we were teachable and willing to depend on our heavenly Father. We need to be renewed in spirit so that we might entrust ourselves with child-like abandonment into the love and care of God and so discover the Father’s deepest mercy. Let us live in the joy of the children of God and manifest the Spirit that transforms the world.

--Father Jerome Machar, OSCO

I Have Engraved You on the Palm of My Hand

But Zion said, ‘The Lord has forsaken me,
   my Lord has forgotten me.’ 
Can a woman forget her nursing-child,
   or show no compassion for the child of her womb?
Even these may forget,
   yet I will not forget you. (Isaiah 49: 14-15)

Anyone who has a “Rambo” or “Terminator” notion of the God of Israel may have a hard time accepting the image of God that Isaiah presented in the first reading. For a moment, I would like you to give up your preconceived notions of the God of the Old Testament and allow the poetry of Isaiah to resonate in your soul. The Old Testament writers provided many images for God: shepherd, king, rock, eagle, potter, father, etc. Our ancestors in the faith contemplated the passage of Genesis wherein it was written that God created man in His image and likeness. As they pondered the tensions residing in the human soul, they had no problem relating to a God who was just and merciful, stern and compassionate.

Earlier in his prophetic utterance, the prophet described God as giving birth to a new creation, “But now, I cry out as a woman in labor, gasping and panting” (Is. 42:14). In today’s first reading, the prophet spoke of God’s motherly love. God responds to the pain and suffering of His people by assuring them that just as a mother’s love is unconditional, so is His. Then God takes the image a step farther. He says that even if a mother’s love should fail, His love never would fail. The prophet tells the people that God would never forget the people to whom He gave birth. In the verse following today’s text we find these memorable words: “Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands” (Is. 49: 16). With these words in mind, it would be good to remember the account of Jesus showing Himself to the disciples after the resurrection: “Look at my hands and my feet. See that it is I myself” (Lk. 24:39). In the person of the Son, the God of the exiles became an exile Himself. By dying on the Cross, Jesus engraved the signs of suffering, sin and death on His body. By rising from the dead, He grafted those wounds to His glorified body for all eternity. Allow me to blend the two passages together. “Behold it is I. Look at my hands and my feet. See how I have engraved you on the palms of my hands for all eternity.”

We need to ponder the hands and feet of Jesus. We need to find in those wounds all our sins, all our sufferings and all our shame. We need to see how Jesus conquered sin and death and transformed them into everlasting life. Looking at those glorious wounds we will find the bond, the connection, the care and the tenderness that God has for us. We need to stretch out our hands to His and allow Him to hold us. Our circumstances may be different from those of the exiles, but our emotional state is very much the same. Some of us may feel alienated from the Church. Some of us may have grown cynical about the political system. Some of us have drifted from our roots and have no place to call “home”. The words Isaiah spoke to his people should find a resonance within us. It seems that no matter how various aspects of society deteriorate, there is one person who is always there for us – MOM.

Life is much bigger than politics, family roots and financial security. Surrounded by people who expend all their energy striving after all these things, it is easy to become dependent on material things and self-sufficient. It does not take too long for us to realize that the ways of the world don’t work. However, this discontent does not mean that we do not experience the Presence of a Power greater than us that gives us peace of mind and heart. Breaking with convention and making use of the image provided by Isaiah allows us to give a name to this powerful presence. As he did to the exiles, the prophet Isaiah speaks to our deepest hurts and pain. Finding ourselves alone with our misery, Isaiah proposes access to the One who could heal our hurts and nurture us to fullness of life. The prophet Isaiah addresses the longings of the human heart when he speaks of a mother’s love and tells the people that God’s love is just like that. In this vane, we hear the words of Jesus in today’s gospel passage. Our Lord and Savior wants to open our eyes to God who is concerned about us and our well-being.  If we accept this description of God, then we can lower our inner anxiety level about ourselves. If we surrender our lives and wills to the love and care of God, we can turn to those who are in distress knowing that they are the focus of God’s concern.

Jesus would have us remember: God is the creator, everything else we pursue is created.  Focusing on created things can cause us to forget God, who is the source of all that is good.  If God is our focus, then the things that concern God about our world should also concern us as well.  Our worth is what we have within us and that is a free gift of God. Nothing we own, or can do for ourselves, gains us value in God’s eyes -- God’s grace is the only sure source of our true “greatness.” Let us pray:

Dear Jesus, the only true center of my life and my choices, thank you for your tender, continually faithful love for me. I'm especially grateful for your patient love when I try to be independent and fail to depend upon you, fail to trust your care. Let me rest in you alone today. In all you call me to do today, let me surrender my anxiety. Let me be courageous and bold in my concern for sharing your love for others. Let me place my life in your hands. Let me fall into your loving embrace so that I can serve you and your people with greater freedom, without fear, with greater zeal, with greater fire. Thank you. (Found on Website of Creighton University)

Father Jerome Machar, OSCO

Repentance and Prayer: The Way to Holiness

12 When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he left Judea and returned to Galilee. 13 But instead of going to Nazareth, he went to Capernaum, beside the Sea of Galilee, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali. 14 This fulfilled Isaiah's prophecy: 15 "In the land of Zebulun and of Naphtali, beside the sea, beyond the Jordan River -- in Galilee where so many Gentiles live -- 16the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light. And for those who lived in the land where death casts its shadow, a light has shined." 17 From then on, Jesus began to preach, "Turn from your sins and turn to God, because the Kingdom of Heaven is near. " 18 One day as Jesus was walking along the shore beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers -- Simon, also called Peter, and Andrew -- fishing with a net, for they were commercial fishermen. 19 Jesus called out to them,"Come, be my disciples, and I will show you how to fish for people!" 20 And they left their nets at once and went with him. 21 A little farther up the shore he saw two other brothers, James and John, sitting in a boat with their father, Zebedee, mending their nets. And he called them to come, too. 22 They immediately followed him, leaving the boat and their father behind. 23 Jesus traveled throughout Galilee teaching in the synagogues, preaching everywhere the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed people who had every kind of sickness and disease.(Matthew 4: 12-23)

When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he went to live in Capernaum. John had been sent to preach the baptism of repentance and to prepare the way for Jesus to come. John told the people, “I have only come to prepare the way for the Messiah, but you do not recognize him. I am not fit to untie his sandal strap. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. Look for him. Wait for him.”  

Wait for the LORD, take courage;

be stouthearted, wait for the LORD! (Psalm 27:14)

The Light has come. He is in our midst. Baptism gives us the grace of adoption as the sons and daughters of God. The grace of baptism never leaves us once it comes upon us. We never stop being a beloved son or daughter of the Father. We may make poor choices. We may place our self-will in opposition to God’s Holy Will. Our vision may be clouded and our will weakened due to sin. Sometimes we choose for the good, sometimes for evil. Even if we choose to sin, we will never cease to be the son or daughter of our Father. We will never cease to be his child. He will never stop loving us.

The Father embraces the Prodigal Son

John and Jesus preached the baptism of repentance. In order for the Holy Spirit to be vibrant in our lives, in order for Jesus to shine forth, we need to repent. Everyone needs to repent. All have sinned and fall short of God’s glory. Pope John Paul II used to go to confession every day. Mother Teresa of Calcutta went every week. The constitutions of her Order say that the sisters must confess weekly. It is embarrassing to go to confession. We have to humble ourselves and confess our sins. But the fruit of this is a tremendous joy. The prophets tell us that there is great joy, abundant joy, when we do God’s will.

I have an older brother who called me up with great joy because he had been to a retreat with  his wife who had forced him to go. And his life had been changed. This was the first retreat he’d ever made in his whole life and he is 70 years old. God entered his life on this retreat, probably through his going to confession. He had so much joy and hope that he had to share them with the family.

What happens when I go to the Lord and admit that I am a sinner? How do I begin a confession? I should say, “Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” This is a good thing to say when we can’t sleep. Say it over and over and you will soon sleep in peace. This is called the Pilgrim’s prayer. It helps us know who we are and who God is.

Sin can wreak havoc in a soul and can also affect our bodies. Our bodies show the effects of sin by making us tense and guilty. We take our sin and go to Jesus who took all our sins upon himself and therefore conquered sin. He is the one who smashed the yoke that burdens us. He took the heavy rod of the taskmaster from our shoulders.

John the Baptist preached baptism for the repentance of sins, and he told us to repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. But Jesus told us that the kingdom of God is already here. If I don’t experience the peace, love, joy, patience, fortitude, and so forth of the Holy Spirit, that means that I need to repent of my sin. I need to give my sins to Jesus, to surrender to God. The Lord told King St. Louis of France that he, Louis, wanted to pray as a saint, but God wanted him to come to the Lord as a poor, humble soul.

Jesus told us that blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. A soul that acknowledges that she needs God is poor in spirit. Go to God poor in spirit. Be humble and repent. That is the first step to holiness.

The second is this. Pray perseveringly. Pray when prayer is beautiful and uplifting, and pray on the days when prayer is not so beautiful. Many people get discouraged when prayer becomes boring and they drop it. God did not ask us to pray well but to pray always, to persevere in prayer. Jesus told us the parable about praying always and not losing heart.

Prayer and repentance are the way holiness.

--Transcribed as best as possible from a homily by Father James Kumbakkeel, O.S.B.,