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homilies
on the liturgy of the Sundays and feasts
by ira j. bell
The Holy Days
13th Sunday of the Year — July 1
“C” Readings: 1 Kings 19:16b, 19:21 • Gal. 5:1, 13-18 • Luke 9:51-62
Title: The Holy Days in Catholic Living.
Purpose: to explain (a) the theology of Holy Days: (b) their history: (c) the present number and observance.
What is holiness? We hear someone say, “She is a very holy person” or “His holiness shines through him.” What does that mean? What does “holy” mean? It means the person has qualities that are Godlike, qualities that are associated with God. St. Peter said: “as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in every aspect of your conduct, for it is written ‘Be holy because I am holy.’ “ St. Peter is telling his hearers that holiness is the result of their call to the knowledge and love of God.
What is a “Holy Day?” A Holy Day is a special day set aside by the Church for the special purpose of giving tribute to God.
Every Sunday is a “Holy Day.” The Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the greatest event of human history. If the Church did not set this day aside, the first day of the week for the purpose of giving attention and worship to God, our weak human nature would probably surrender completely to secularism and the glitz of the world would draw our attention entirely away from our Creator, our Lord and Savior, our final goal.
As a good mother nourishes and teaches her child, so does our mother, the Catholic Church, provide for our spiritual worship of God. The Church tells her children that there is an obligation to worship God. The Church’s Canon Law states, “On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass.”
Participation in God is work. It requires effort. As we strive at this work, the work becomes a joy. The more knowledge we have of the worship of God, the greater is the desire for God. The greater the desire, the holier we become.
As the Church grew throughout the centuries it began to set aside certain days as holy days in order to celebrate these great events of our Lord’s life. On Christmas Day we celebrate his birth. On Easter Sunday we celebrate his resurrection from the dead. Some events are so important that the Church tells us it is required that we attend Mass in order to celebrate the event.
Our country declares “holidays” (a word which is really derived from “holy day”) so that our people will always remember the great events of our country’s history — for example we have “Independence Day” celebrated each year on July 4th.
We all have certain obligations to do things. We have an obligation not to speed. A person also has moral obligations and since the Church is our teacher it tells its children what these obligations are. There are certain Holy Days which we must observe, we have an obligation to attend Mass on these days and the obligation is very serious. Thus, a Holy Day of Obligation.
As our country has a history of great events, Independence Day to celebrate our freedom, Thanksgiving Day to show gratitude to God for his gifts, and Veterans’ Day to remember our war heroes, so the Church has a history of the holy events of God in our liturgical life.
The real history of the spiritual meaning of a Holy Day is found in the Third Commandment of God. The Israelites received the first Holy Day from God on Mount Sinai: “Remember the sabbath day and keep it holy. For six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath for Yahweh your God. You shall do no work on that day, neither you nor your son nor your daughter nor your servants, men or women, nor your animals nor the stranger who lives with you. For in six days Yahweh made the heavens and the earth and the sea and all these hold, but on the seventh day he rested; that is why Yahweh had blessed the sabbath day and made it sacred” (Exod. 20:8-11).
No devout Jew would fail to keep the Sabbath holy. The Jews considered it a sacred obligation. When Jesus, the Messiah, rose from the dead on Sunday, the Church changed this obligation to Sunday, the first day of the week. Every true Catholic should feel joy in the obligation of worshipping God on Sunday and Holy Days.
The Third Commandment was given to us by God. All commandments are acts of God’s love. God said, “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy” (Exod. 20:8). A quick answer to the question, “Why do you go to Mass on Sunday?” would be, “Because God commanded me to; I can’t do anything better than what God wants.”
It was on Mount Sinai that the Israelites received this commandment from God. It was revealed by God that this day should be kept holy. It is from this command that the Catholic Church has made the moral tradition of attending Mass and keeping from unnecessary work the first of the “Precepts of the Church.”
The obligation of Sunday Mass unifies the Catholic Church. A convert once said that her conversion began when she was sitting by her window on a cold snowy Sunday morning; she wondered, “Why do these Catholics do it? I want to find out.” She did.
The Jewish Sabbath was replaced by the Sunday in New Testament times. If you were a Christian living in the first century and were with St. Paul and the Christians of Troas, you would have assembled to attend Mass on the first day of the week, “to break bread” (Acts 20:7). If you were with St. Paul at Corinth, you would have been asked to give alms on that day (1 Cor. 16:2). Even in the first century there was a collection at Mass.
The event in our holy faith of the Resurrection of Jesus from the dead on Easter Sunday was the event that eventually separated the believers in Jesus Christ from the Jews who did not accept him. We have records of the practice of Sunday Mass as early as the first century. A further reason for celebration of Mass on Sunday was the descent of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost Sunday.
Gradually through the centuries the Church began to require, through its Canon Law, that Catholics attend Mass every Sunday and Holy Day. The Church has always considered attendance at Sunday Mass the primary duty of a Catholic. It was in 1918 that Canon Law specified that each Sunday of the year was a “Holy Day of Obligation.”
In the United States there are six Holy Days which the faithful are required to observe. These are: Mary, Mother of God (New Years’ Day); Ascension Thursday, 40 days after Easter (in some dioceses the observance is transferred to the following Sunday); Assumption of the Virgin Mary (August 15); All Saints Day (November 1); The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8); and The Nativity of the Lord (Christmas) on December 25.
In recent times there have been some adjustments to the Holy Days according to the discretion of the local bishop. If the Holy Day falls on Saturday or on Monday, the bishop may remove the “obligation” to attend Mass. The observance of the day is no less holy.
One time a priest was asked what he thought was the mark of a devout Catholic. He paused, thought a moment, and answered, “I suppose when a Catholic no longer says, ‘I gotta go to Mass, and says, what a blessing to go to Mass and worship God. It’s the greatest thing we ever do.’ “
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2042, 2180-85.
Bond of marriage
14th Sunday of the Year — July 8
“C” Readings: Isaiah 66:10-14c • Gal. 6:14-18 • Luke 10:1-12, 17-20
Title: The Divorced Catholic
Purpose: (1) to describe the number of divorced in USA and among USA Catholics; (2) to licit understanding of them and encouragement of them.
Of all the problems which the Church faces today, certainly the problem of the divorced Catholic is one of the heaviest problems. The Church teaches that marriage cannot be dissolved. The Bible teaches that “they are no longer two, but one flesh” (Matt. 9:6). The couple is called to “grow continually in their communion through day-to-day fidelity to their marriage promise of total mutual self-giving”
(Familiaris Consortio #19). The Church teaches that if a couple prayerfully commit themselves to Jesus Christ and are “Married in Christ,” Jesus will grant the graces to handle the “in good times and bad” which may come. Many in our society see their marriages end in divorce. Their beautiful dreams and plans are shattered by divorce. Many Catholics enter civil divorce. What does the Church teach about this condition of society?
The Second Vatican Council teaches that love cannot be an arrangement “until further notice.” The “intimate union of marriage, as a mutual giving of two persons, and the good of the children, demands total fidelity from the spouses and requires an unbreakable union between them” (Gaudium et Spes, 48 #1).
Yet, there are many divorces. Why? There are many causes. Many reasons can be given why marriages break up. Any marriage counselor will have his book filled with the many causes why couples break up. But many married couples, when asked why marriages did not last will say, “Basically because there was a failure to keep the commitment to the ideals we shared when we entered the marriage.” They may say that situations arose for which they were not prepared to cope. They found that the person they married turned out to be someone they really did not know.
The Church tries to teach that something so important as marriage should have a time of great preparation. In most dioceses today the Church requires that the engaged couple register for their marriage at least six months in advance. The spouses are asked to attend a number of conferences with married couples. They are asked to go over a number of statements concerning attitudes that each may have toward marriage. In most cases the couple is strengthened in their views and values toward a life long union. Yet, after all this, so many divorce. The culture in which we live is far different from the culture of other ages when times were more stable and supportive of the sanctity and tradition of marriage. There is divorce. It is not the divorce which is so much the danger to the person’s salvation as the temptation to enter into an invalid marriage.
Divorce does injury to the covenant of salvation of which sacramental marriage is the sign. An injured soul needs all the help it can get from the Church and from Catholic friends.
Most Churches today have programs for people in this difficult situation. There is a program for “Divorced and Separated Catholics” to offer help. Many people who divorce suddenly have many questions which never occurred to them before. The faithful Catholic wants to follow the teachings of the Church and wants to live as Christ wants them to live.
“Toward Christians who live in this situation, and who often keep the faith and desire to bring up their children in a Christian manner, priests and the whole community must manifest an attentive solicitude, so that they do not consider themselves separated from the Church, in whose life they can and must participate as baptized persons:
“They should be encouraged to listen to the Word of God, attend the Sacrifice of the Mass, to persevere in prayer, to contribute to works of charity and to community efforts for justice, to bring up their children in the Christian faith, to cultivate the spirit and practice of penance and thus implore, day by day, God’s grace” (FC 84).
“Therefore let no man separate what God has joined” (Mark 10:9). Is it possible that two people exchanging married vows are not in fact able psychologically to make the commitment necessary for a permanent, indissoluble bond? Can there be an incapacity of a psychic nature that makes it unlikely that at this time a permanent bond was entered? The Church in some instances decides the issue.
A Decree of Nullity is a statement issued by an ecclesiastical court that a true bond of marriage never existed. The Church, first of all, is concerned about the salvation of her children. The Church wishes to help her children get to heaven.
Today’s culture develops great confusion in society and presents many false values to people. It is possible for couples to enter marriage with false values as to what “Marriage in Christ” really means. Therefore, tribunals, with the help of experts in the field of mental health and development, following a canonical procedure in judging the couple, will grant a “Decree of Nullity” of the union. This is not a “Divorce” but a statement that there was never a true bond.
We must all live by Jesus’ command: “Do not judge and you will not be judged.” “Love one another as I have loved you.”
As every Christian knows, we are all sinners. We all are in need of the mercy of God. We are all in need of God’s love and need the help of our fellow Christians. We need to question ourselves on ways that we can find to help those whose marriages end in divorce. They need to know they have support. The need to know they have friends. Jesus said, “Love one another as I have loved you.”
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1650, 1664, 2382-86, 2400;
The Catholic Catechism, Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., pp. 356-58.
Love in action
15th Sunday of the Year — July 15
“C” Readings: Deut. 30:10-14 • Col. 1:15-20 • Luke 10:25-37
Title: The Virtue of Love
Purpose: (1) to explain this virtue as self-forgetfulness and dedication to others, (2) to show its importance and its infrequency in modern society.
Perhaps the most misunderstood word today is the word “love.” Yet it is certainly one of the most important of all words. An American writer once said in an essay that love makes the world go around. Indeed it does. What is love?
If we pick up a dictionary for the meaning of the word, it says: love is an intense affectionate concern for another person; an intense sexual desire for another person.
It is the second definition of the word love which is confusing. Certainly today our media, soap operas, novels, etc. almost always give a false impression of what love is.
Spiritual writers say that love is an impulse, a tendency of the soul towards good. It is an overflowing of oneself on another. This takes a use of the will. That is why St. John said that “God is love.”
It is important, then, to say first of all what love is not. It is not to think of oneself. Jesus never said that love was to think of oneself. He said that the greatest commandment was to love God and neighbor as we love ourselves.
In Scriptures, St. John says that we are liars if we say we love God and do not love our neighbor whom we see. We live with our neighbor, we work with our neighbor, we do business with our neighbor. We are to love our neighbor. God commands it.
Love is in action. Jesus spoke of the difference between “saying” and “doing.” It is much harder to do a thing than to merely say a thing. In today’s jargon a person will say, “Put up or shut up.” A person can say a thing but not do it. Love in action is the only language which can be understood.
It is said that a person who has the ability to speak another’s language can be two persons because of the ability to talk with another. So, if we are to reach other people with the Gospel, with the teachings of Jesus, we had better learn the language of Jesus. That language is compassion and mercy. This is the only language which people really understand, the language they see in action. Love in action is what the world needs.
Mother Teresa of Calcutta went to India over fifty years ago. She heard God say to her that he wanted her to go to the “poorest of the poor.” She went to the place in the world where she found the greatest poverty and to bring Jesus’s love there. She saw Jesus in every person. Today there are over four thousand Missionaries of Charity, her order, working in more than a hundred places throughout the world and bringing the love of Christ to the world. It is forgetting self and service of others that people understand. Deeds speak louder than words.
Often today we hear the phrase, “give until it hurts.” That is why we know that true love and sacrifice go together. A man writing a check to his daughter as a birthday gift may be a good thing, but it may cost him little effort. Finding some time to spend with her might be something of greater value. Usually children look back and remember the time their parents spent with them as the greatest influence in their lives.
Mother Teresa once said, “Once we take our eyes away from ourselves, from our interests, from our own rights, privileges, ambitions — then we will become clear to see Jesus around us.” Mother Teresa says feeling the pain of being “unwanted” is the greatest of all pain.
Today each newscast brings us more signs of violence. We see the killing among the Israelis and the Palestinians. We see the hatred between Irishmen, those in the North and those in the South of Ireland. What is the cause? Hatred will never solve the problem.
The history of the world seems to be the history of war. It sees to be the history of hate. Can the world change? Yes! All that is needed is that those in the world change. Has war ever changed anything?
Some years ago a seminary professor gave an example to his students. He said, “If a man makes a fist and knocks another man down — the victim of the blow will only want to get up and strike back.” So, we constantly hear the word “retaliate.” Has retaliation ever brought peace? Or we hear, “Negotiate from a position of strength.” Temporary peace is brought about by surrender to overpowering force. Treaties are made. Peace is held for a while, but the lessons of history have taught that after a while war starts again. People need hearts formed according to the teachings of Jesus.
The late Archbishop Fulton Sheen once used this example: “Twenty people are lined up, the first strikes the second, the second strikes the third, and so on; then someone refuses to strike the next person and decides peace will never come with a strike.”
Mahatma Ghandi, the great Indian leader, used to read the New Testament. He made the remark, “If all Christians followed the teachings of Jesus, the whole world would be Christian.”
Once an atheist writer said in rebuke, “Christianity has been tried and failed, we need something else.” The famous author and convert to Catholicism, Gilbert K. Chesterton, answered that Christianity has not been tried and failed — Christianity has never really been tried.”
Our present Pope, John Paul II, has probably written more than any other pope in Christian history. He prays for peace every day. In the Jubilee Year 2000 we saw him, the first pope in Christian history, go to the Western Wall (The Wailing Wall) in Israel and pray for peace — the wall where Jews go to bring their needs to God.
A most important attitude needed for peace is the change of heart needed for peace. The sins of past history cannot be undone. But they can be forgiven. The Pope asked for forgiveness for all the Catholics of Christian history who have failed to live and keep the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
It is not easy to ask for forgiveness, we all have the sin of pride. But it is necessary to ask for forgiveness. It is the only way to peace. We cannot hold on to bitter memories of the past no matter how bad they have been. All the world must believe that God is Creator and that Jesus is Redeemer. All the world must know that all people are brothers and sisters. It is a world of much good and much evil. This has always been the case. But there are solutions. Evil can be overcome by good. That is the solution. And love is the only way to do it. Jesus said, “Love one another, as I have loved you.”
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1941, 2305, 1784, 1829, 2302, 1717.
What is prayer?
16th Sunday of the Year — July 22
“C” Readings: Gen. 18:1-10 • Col. 1:24-28 • Luke 10:38-42
Title: Prayer
Purpose: (1) to describe and define prayer (2) to show its importance for living a life in Christ.
The Church teaches us what to believe, a faith which has come down to us from the twelve Apostles. The church celebrates this faith in its sacramental liturgy. What the Church “believes and teaches” relates us to Christ and this relationship is prayer.
From the time we were children we learned that prayer is a “lifting up of the heart and mind to God.” It is an asking of God what we need. This definition goes back to St. John Damascene, who was born around 676.
Prayer is as old as God talking to his creatures and his creatures listening to God. As old as God talking to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Paradise. As old as God talking to the prophets; all these events we read about in the Old Testament. A great retreat master once said while he was giving a conference on prayer, “Don’t do all the talking. Do a lot of listening.” Prayer is listening.
It is important what we say, because what we say depends upon what we believe. It is important what we believe, because that is the way we pray.
Prayer is something that God gives us. One of the first things a good father and mother do is to teach their little children how to pray. “Did you say your night prayers?” It is wonderful when husband and wife pray together. It is wonderful when families pray together. Many families pray together. Many say a decade of the rosary or one of the children reads a short passage from the Bible before they begin their dinner. What a great memory this leaves with the children!
It is necessary to have the right disposition when we pray. It is possible that when a person prays the person can pray from the height of pride. We all know the parable our Lord told of the two men who went into the Temple to pray. One was a Pharisee and the other a Publican. The Pharisee began by telling God how good he was. Then he thanked God that he was not like that Publican in the back of the Temple. The Publican in his humility prayed to God with great humility, and would not even look up to heaven. He merely beat his breast and said, “Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.” Jesus said that this man was justified and the Pharisee was not. We must always ask God to teach us how to pray and ask for the grace to pray with humility. St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans said, “we do not know how to pray as we ought” (Rom. 8:26). St. Augustine in one of his great sermons said that we are beggars before God. That is the spirit of prayer we should have.
People are searching for God. There are so many incidents today of people exhausting themselves with all the wealth and pleasurable things of the world and then finding that they still are not satisfied. In their lonely moments they feel a great emptiness in their soul. That is a desire for God. God may give the grace to pray, “God help me!” St. Augustine in his Confessions recited the great prayer, “You have made us for yourself Oh God, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” Sometimes it is only after a life of sin that a person comes to God. A doctor who ran an abortion clinic said that it was only after he hit “rock bottom” that he came to God. He knew that he needed something other than what his experiences of life had given him. At a moment of despair he raised his mind to God and asked for help.
We are born because God wanted us to be born. We are baptized so that we may receive the life of Jesus Christ. A Christian is supposed to live Jesus’ life and always be conscious that he has this life. Pope Pius X said it was our purpose to “Restore all things in Christ.” That is also what our present pope, John Paul II says. Our present pope spends many hours every day in prayer, in talking to God and begging for the graces which the Church needs.
In the Old Testament we read how prayer is presented as a battle of faith when Abraham is told by God to sacrifice his only son. Abraham could not understand God, but was obedient. Then his faith was purified and he understood. Prayer gives us understanding.
Moses complained to God. But once he began to understand God’s promises his prayer became a great example of intercessory prayer and the Passover and Exodus of the Israelites from slavery to the promised land came about. And this promise is eventually given when Jesus Christ comes, “the one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim. 2:5).
There are many ways to give ourselves to God and that is what God wants most of all. He loves us and wants us to return that love. Once a nun was overheard to say, when she had a chore to perform, “one more chance to do an act of love for God.” This is a proper disposition for prayer.
Jesus tells us of the necessity of praying. We read how he often went into the hills to spend the night in communion with God. Once, when the Apostles went searching for him they found him like this, in prayer to his Father. They said, “Lord, teach us to pray,” and Jesus taught them the Lord’s prayer, the “Our Father.” How many billions of times it has been said since it came from the lips of Jesus!
One time the great saint, Teresa of Avila, was asked by one of her novices, “Mother, how can one meditate for an hour?” St. Teresa answered, “Say the Our Father very slowly for an hour, and you will make an hour of meditation.”
Once we really try to learn what prayer is, it becomes very easy and we can never find enough time to say all the prayers we want. Often we experience a great peace and serenity and we never want to leave it. But we have to. And we also have to know that prayer can be even more valuable for our soul when we don’t feel like praying, yet we persevere in prayer. What gives most benefit in strengthening a person — swimming upstream or downstream?
We adore God when our mind and heart ascend to him. Our mind “ascends” to God in the Holy Spirit through Christ to the Father and we bless him for having blessed us (Eph. 1:13-14). This passage is known as a “Hymn of Our Redemption.” A person could easily spend an hour in adoration of God by reciting it slowly with all the heart.
How many times people came out to our Lord asking for things! When we do this we are doing the same thing that people did at the time of the New Testament. A centurion came to Jesus asking that his son get well. A woman had a bleeding for twelve years and had such faith that she said, “If I can only touch the hem of his garment I will be healed.” A paralyzed man was carried by friends and let down through the roof in front of Jesus so that Jesus could cure him. Bartimaeus (Mark 10:46-52) when he heard Jesus come by cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!” Jesus gave him his sight. The blind man was grateful and prayed by “following Jesus on the way.”
Mother Teresa of Calcutta said, “we learn to pray by praying.” We learn anything by doing it. A golfer learns to play golf by playing. A person learns another language by talking it, by reading it. So, let us not waste too much time with “methods of prayer.” Just pray!
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2558, 2559, 2572, 2574.
Our best weapon
17th Sunday of the Year — July 29
“C” Readings: Gen. 18:20-32 • Col. 2:12-14 • Luke 11:1-13
Title: Prayer (B)
Purpose: (1) to explain why some Christians give up praying; (2) to encourage all to perseverance in prayer.
Part of our faith is to understand that we will never be without temptation. It is to understand that there is a war going on between good and evil. Evil and temptation must be fought and prayer is the greatest weapon we have. People can stop praying for a number of reasons.
When people give up prayer, they make themselves weak and many evil things can happen to them until they return to prayer. Broken marriages, defection from a vocation, a fall to alcohol, betrayal of God’s commandments, etc. Evils of many kinds enter the soul. When people stop praying, stop talking and listening to God, they let down a great weapon. That is why we must always pray.
Some do not realize that prayer is an effort. All the great figures of the Bible have taught that prayer is a battle. It is a weapon that is needed for victory of any kind. Sometimes it can even be in the form of a complaint: Moses complained to God, “Why did you give me these people?” St. Teresa of Avila was supposed to have said to God, “You would have more friends if you treated them better.” The battle is against ourselves and against the Devil.
Sometimes too much affluence and too much “success” can wean a person away from prayer. A man once said to a priest, “When I wake up on Sunday morning I say a few words to God, isn’t that enough?” Later on when some troubles came into his life he began to go to daily Mass.
As soon as a child is able to be taught, a good parent teaches the child to pray. The struggle for God never leaves us. The battle against the forces of evil, the world, the flesh, and the Devil, never leaves us.
People have been known to say that they don’t need God. Some say: “I don’t have time to pray.” We have all the time there is. Again and again we have heard from people that once they make time to pray, they find that they get everything else done also. Remember that prayer is a gift, it has to be asked for. The Apostles said to Jesus, “Lord teach us to pray.”
Sometimes it is thought that prayer is a superstitious thing, not manly. Frederick Ozanam was a French historian and professor of history. One time a student was having serious battles and doubts about his Catholic faith. He was on the verge of giving it all up — all prayer and practice of prayer. As one last resort he went into a church one day. In the darkened church he saw an old man praying and as he got closer he thought it was someone he knew. He found his professor, Frederick Ozanam, bent in prayer. He said to himself, “If that great man I admire so much, finds solutions in prayer, then so will I.”
Louis Pasteur was a great French chemist. One day a “sophomore” got on a train in France and noticed an elderly man with his rosary in his hand. The student fancied himself an atheist. He went up to the elderly man and said, “I can see that you are superstitious and ignorant. I am a college student and when a person begins to learn they know that religion and prayer is only for those who are superstitious.” The old man reached into his pocket and handed a card to the student. It read, “Louis Pasteur, Professor of Science.”
It is not required that a person be an intellectual to pray well. Throughout history many holy people could neither read nor write. There is a story of a learned Protestant minister who was making a tour of Ireland. He had a lot of questions about his own beliefs. His car broke down in front of a cottage. When he entered he saw the house full of religious pictures and statues. He asked the woman, “Would you tell me about your Faith? How you understand it and what it means to your life?” She simply detailed for him the teachings of her Catholic religion and especially how she loved to pray. After he left, the minister undertook a study of the Catholic religion and asked to be received into the Church. Often difficulties come from a lack of knowledge of the Faith. Today the Church pleads that Catholics have a copy of the new Catechism of the Catholic Church and spend some time studying it.
If we are not vigilant we can be taken in by the culture. We might hear a person say, “That can’t be taught in these times.” The heresy of Modernism is raising its head again. Lovers of profit and affluence might say, “Prayer is useless and unproductive.” People who do most for the world are always people of prayer.
Christians have to face difficulties and what they consider failure in prayer. There can be discouragement and dryness in prayer. People can be disappointed in prayer because they think they are not heard. “God does not hear my prayers.” No prayer goes unheard by God. Prayer is always heard, but not always according to the way we want it to be heard. Trust in God’s Providence, God’s way is necessary to every believer. A person may want to ask what good is it to pray? These obstacles will be overcome when the person asks God for humility, trust, and perseverance.
Perseverance in prayer is persevering in the love of God. St. Paul said to the Thessalonians, “Pray constantly . . . always and for everything giving thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to the Father” (1 Thess. 5:17; Eph. 5:20). Constant prayer can only come from a love of God. We are dull, we are lazy, we must ask God for humility and the trust we need. We have to ask for persevering love. Remember, the Apostles asked our Lord to teach them to pray.
It is always possible to pray. Once a missionary who was imprisoned by the Communists was told to turn over everything he had on his person and was given a prisoner’s gown to wear. He would not turn over his rosary and when they tried to take it, he said, “If ever I get free I will tell the world that Communism persecutes religion”. The Communists did not want that. He was an American and they did not want the world to think of martyrs. He was allowed to keep his rosary, and he told the priests to whom he was giving a retreat that he recited it about eighteen times a day and it helped him keep his sanity until he was released.
St. John Chrysostom said, “It is possible to offer fervent prayer even while walking in public or strolling along, or seated in your shop . . . while buying or selling . . . or even while cooking.” Prayer is powerful if one perseveres in it.
Suggested reading: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2725, 2737, 2743, 2738-41, 2742, 2582.
Reverend Ira J. Bell is a retired priest living at Regina Cleri, home for retired priests in the Archdiocese of St. Louis. He helps out in several retirement homes for senior citizens. Ordained in 1952, he served in eight parishes, three of them as pastor. For fifteen years he was spiritual director of the Legion of 1000, a group of men and women who pledge themselves to make weekly visits to the Blessed Sacrament at the Carmelite and Pink Sisters chapels. His last series of homilies in HPR appeared in July 2000.
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