Why Pray?
Our Hearts Are Restless
Why would anyone want to pray? I want to pray because I want to be happy. Happiness is to possess the good things that complete or fulfill our human nature. In general, God designed the Human Person to need certain good things to be satisfied. We need…
1. Physical goods (food, shelter, health, safety, security, exercise, rest)
2. Psychological goods (stability and variety)
3. Family and Friendship – the love and acceptance of other persons
4. Knowledge
5. Meaningful Work / Achievement / Contribution / a sense that we are needed and useful
6. Beauty
7. Identity (our specific place in the world)
If you had all these would you be perfectly satisfied? No! And that is the right answer because even though the things of the world are good…the Problem lies in this…
· Nothing is Perfect
· Not Lasting
· Never Enough
o I desire more
o I desire union with God
We were made for union with God
· To share in, drink in, swim in His
· Divine, Perfect, Everlasting and Infinite Life
Today is the Feast of St Augustine and he summed up this desire for union with God when he wrote “you have made us for yourself, O Lord and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
Living Water
The good things in life are the cups – Jesus is the Living Water
The good things in life we need to be happy – physical, emotional, family, friends, meaningful work, knowledge, beauty, ect… are like cups
· But Jesus is the Living Water that needs to fill the cups
· And without the Living Water, without a personal relationship with Jesus, then we might have all the right cups, but they are empty
Then we become unsatisfied with our spouse, our house, our job, our health and wealth and everything else.
The danger is that we think the problem is with the cup. The cup is empty so we think the problem is with the cup and we think we can solve the problem by getting rid of this cup and getting a different cup, a different spouse or house or vacation or better health or whatever. But the problem was not with the cup
The problem is not with the cup, the problem is that the cup is empty of the Living Water, empty of the personal relationship with Jesus that comes through prayer. A different or new cup wont solve the problem. The solution is to fill our existing cups, fill our lives with the Living Water that is Jesus that comes through prayer.
Prayer is the Self-Opening of the Human Spirit to God
A Personal relationship with Jesus is the Living Water that can fill up every area of life so that we can be satisfied. In John 7 Jesus stood and cried out: 'If any man is thirsty, let him come to me! Let the man come to me and drink…For My heart is a Fountain of living water.” The Seven Sacraments of the Catholic Church are the Fountains from which the Living Water flows. The Eucharist is the Fountain par excellence because the Eucharist is literally the Heart of Jesus. If you want to drink the Living Water, then you must to come to the Heart of Jesus. The sacraments, especially the Eucharist, is the Fountain. But it is possible to come to the well and not drink. Not only do we need to come to the fountain, but we need to open up and Drink the Living Water. We drink in the Living Water of Jesus by Prayer. Pope Benedict writes: “Prayer is the self-opening of the human spirit to God.” (Jesus of Nazareth vol 2, p. 233) Many people come to the Fountain of Living Water but they do not drink in the living water because they do not have a personal friendship with Jesus in prayer and they spend little or no time in prayer.
Talking, Listening and Just Being Together
Prayer is friendship with God. What does friendship take? Time… time talking, listening, and just being together. The Great Teresa of Avila writes “Prayer…is nothing else than an intimate sharing between friends; its means taking time frequently to be alone with him who we know loves us.”
St. Josemaria Escriva writes: “To pray is to talk with God. But about what?' About what? About Him, about yourself: joys, sorrows, successes and 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 Way, # 91
So Prayer is friendship with God: it is talking, listening and just being together. This corresponds to the three major expressions of prayer:
· Vocal prayer - speaking to God;
· Meditation – listening to God;
· Contemplation – just being with the One who loves us
Learning to Listen
Prayer is friendship with God, talking to him from the heart, listening and just spending time with Him. We want to drink the Living Water, but have you ever experienced that you cant talk and drink at the same time. If you try to talk and drink you will choke and cough and then it goes up our nose. That’s bad enough if its water but it really burns if its whiskey and that’s a sad waste if its good whiskey – like Jaimason. The point is – we want to be happy. To be happy our cups need to be filled with the Living Water that is Jesus. But we cant drink in the Living Water if unless we spend time in prayer and we cant drink him in unless we stop talking in prayer and spend time listening, and that is what meditation or mental prayer is – listening to God so that we can drink more deeply the Living Water and be happy.