April 2022 homily
A little teaching on PRAYER
From “The Ladder of Divine Ascent” by St John of Mt Sinai (late 6th century)
“ Prayer by reason of its nature is the converse and union of man with God…it upholds the world and brings about reconciliation with God; it is the mother and also the daughter of tears, the propitiation for sins, a bridge over temptations, a wall against afflictions, a crushing of conflicts, work of angels, food of all the spiritual beings, future gladness, boundless activity, the spring of virtues, the source of graces, invisible progress, food of the soul, the enlightening of the mind…, a demonstration of hope, the annulling of sorrow…a revelation of the future, a sign of glory…”
“Let your prayer be completely simple. For both the publican and the prodigal son were reconciled to God by a single phrase.”
(from Step 28 of the “Ladder” on prayer)
These words concern the personal prayer we say from day to day at home or at work.
Liturgical prayer has its own relation to the life of the community and how we encounter God as His People assembled before Him. Our personal prayer flows from this liturgical action and also flows into it. But generally it is something we do on our own or perhaps as a family in its home. This is my own poor advice regarding this.
First, I would heed St John’s counsel to make your prayer “completely simple.” There are beautiful and concise prayers from the services – for instance from the little services of the Hours which we can use; or the Prayer of the Hours: “Christ, God, longsuffering, great in compassion and mercy, who love the just and show mercy on those who are hardened in sin…” Or the oft-repeated prayer used in funerals and memorials: “God of spirit and all flesh…” Or some of the paschal hymns. These prayers are short, brilliantly composed and inclusive of all we need to say, and they are tremendously hopeful. We should all say the prayer “O Heavenly King” to the Holy Spirit and the Trisagion Prayers, which we should learn by heart. These are not long winded prayers or ones that we struggle to understand or take to heart. They have an evangelical simplicity.
Or we can concentrate on some form of the ”Jesus Prayer” with or without a prayer rope: “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me (or”…have mercy on me a sinner.”) This is essentially the publican’s prayer referenced above. It has the great virtue of being absolutely basic, requiring no intellectual interpretation. Its meaning is obvious no matter how many times we repeat it. We can vary it by saying “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on him (or her or them or us)” - for people about whom we are concerned. Or for the world.
By praying every day we open ourselves to God who is always present to us. The words we say become words of the Spirit informing and forming our hearts. We give ourselves the best break from our obsession with our rambling thoughts. If we don’t pray, we leave a spiritual vacuum in our hearts that will be filled by all kinds of vain or harmful, rubbishy thoughts. We need prayer to break open our hearts to God.
Through the words we say, God speaks to us. Prayer is listening.
One final thought. Beware of looking for emotional affirmation, some kind of ‘high’ from prayer. If we are looking for the emotive charge, this charged feeling truly becomes an idol distracting us from God, who dwells in silence, not ever to be captured in our feelings or thoughts and held within them. This dwelling on emotions in prayer is called ‘pietism’ and it has afflicted every form of Christianity in some way. It is an impediment to prayer, because in prayer we encounter God as totally transcendent and yet mercifully present to us. Let’s work on prayer in what’s left of Lent and always.
- Fr Tom