ONE episode in the gospel can give us a good lesson on prayer which,
by necessity, will involve some battle of the heart. That’s when
Christ visited the temple area and found it turned into a market
place.
“My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of
thieves,” (Lk 19,46) he cried out. And he proceeded to drive out those
who were selling things.
We all have the natural tendency to pray, although we may not call it
that. The fact that we think, we reason out, we reflect, we hold some
kind of conversation, if not with God or with nature or with the
environment, then with our own selves—all these indicate that we are
going through the motions of praying.
Praying is the natural mode of action of our mind and heart. Our
thoughts, decisions and feelings are never solitary acts. A kind of
communication is involved whenever we think, know, judge, reason, and
especially when we love.
These are the operations involved when we pray. To make them prayer,
we just have to make sure that we bring these operations to their
proper object and to their fullest stature, driven by their true
motives, and not frustrated in their development or, worse, twisted
and corrupted by some spiritual and moral errors.
The latter cases can be likened to those who converted the house of
God from a “house of prayer to a den of thieves.” We cannot help but
pray since we always have to think and reason out. But we would be
misusing or misdirecting our prayer, or we would simply be not
developing our prayer properly if all these operations are not
inspired and directed to God.
At the core of this challenge is the battle of the heart, the very
seat of our freedom where the decision of whom to pray, how to pray,
what to pray, etc. is made. The heart is where we make the fundamental
and existential choices. It’s important that we are aware of the
crucial and strategic role of the heart in this duty of ours.
Many people, perhaps because they are still children or not properly
trained and educated, have little care for their heart, and thus have
a very shallow understanding of prayer. They allow their heart to be
influenced mainly by emotions and other instinctual impulses. Their
mind and heart are not yet firmly grounded on terra firma.
They just content themselves with mouthing some prayer formulas and
going through social conventions about piety. Not much else. They can
say much, but they don’t connect.
In time, they get bored and don’t last in their prayer. They don’t
understand some of the requirements of prayer—faith, sacrifice,
perseverance, humility, etc.—and often find themselves confused,
uninspired, if not storm-tossed by the troubles in life that they
cannot find meaning in.
Others have gone worse, in the sense that they allow their heart to be
dominated by their passions and worldly attachments, practically
selling themselves out to these elements and cutting themselves off
from the very source of the heart’s life, God, who actually dwells
there as our Creator and guiding providence.
We need to deliberately guard our heart and direct it to God. And
given our human condition where we are easily overrun by human
concerns, not to mention our weaknesses and the temptations around, we
really need to have a firm grip on our heart. We should avoid letting
it go and run unguided.
For this we need time to pray and meditate, to immerse our heart in
the presence of God and as much as possible to taste of the sweetness
of God that includes his wisdom, power, mercy, unfailing love for us,
etc.
We need to be intimate with him. And this is something that we have to
understand well, because many people are afraid to go intimate with
God. They feel awkward about it. They sometimes think it is unnatural,
inhuman, unmanly. The only intimacy they know is of the sexual kind,
which is a completely reduced if not erroneous understanding of
intimacy.
Our heart is meant to enter into intimate relations, but of the proper
kind, first with God and then with God, following his commandments,
with everybody else. Our heart has to overflow with affections. That’s
what is proper of it. Intimacy is what truly humanizes our heart,
opening it to its divinization in God and in our love for others.
So, let’s ask ourselves, where is our heart? Let’s win it for God!
by necessity, will involve some battle of the heart. That’s when
Christ visited the temple area and found it turned into a market
place.
“My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of
thieves,” (Lk 19,46) he cried out. And he proceeded to drive out those
who were selling things.
We all have the natural tendency to pray, although we may not call it
that. The fact that we think, we reason out, we reflect, we hold some
kind of conversation, if not with God or with nature or with the
environment, then with our own selves—all these indicate that we are
going through the motions of praying.
Praying is the natural mode of action of our mind and heart. Our
thoughts, decisions and feelings are never solitary acts. A kind of
communication is involved whenever we think, know, judge, reason, and
especially when we love.
These are the operations involved when we pray. To make them prayer,
we just have to make sure that we bring these operations to their
proper object and to their fullest stature, driven by their true
motives, and not frustrated in their development or, worse, twisted
and corrupted by some spiritual and moral errors.
The latter cases can be likened to those who converted the house of
God from a “house of prayer to a den of thieves.” We cannot help but
pray since we always have to think and reason out. But we would be
misusing or misdirecting our prayer, or we would simply be not
developing our prayer properly if all these operations are not
inspired and directed to God.
At the core of this challenge is the battle of the heart, the very
seat of our freedom where the decision of whom to pray, how to pray,
what to pray, etc. is made. The heart is where we make the fundamental
and existential choices. It’s important that we are aware of the
crucial and strategic role of the heart in this duty of ours.
Many people, perhaps because they are still children or not properly
trained and educated, have little care for their heart, and thus have
a very shallow understanding of prayer. They allow their heart to be
influenced mainly by emotions and other instinctual impulses. Their
mind and heart are not yet firmly grounded on terra firma.
They just content themselves with mouthing some prayer formulas and
going through social conventions about piety. Not much else. They can
say much, but they don’t connect.
In time, they get bored and don’t last in their prayer. They don’t
understand some of the requirements of prayer—faith, sacrifice,
perseverance, humility, etc.—and often find themselves confused,
uninspired, if not storm-tossed by the troubles in life that they
cannot find meaning in.
Others have gone worse, in the sense that they allow their heart to be
dominated by their passions and worldly attachments, practically
selling themselves out to these elements and cutting themselves off
from the very source of the heart’s life, God, who actually dwells
there as our Creator and guiding providence.
We need to deliberately guard our heart and direct it to God. And
given our human condition where we are easily overrun by human
concerns, not to mention our weaknesses and the temptations around, we
really need to have a firm grip on our heart. We should avoid letting
it go and run unguided.
For this we need time to pray and meditate, to immerse our heart in
the presence of God and as much as possible to taste of the sweetness
of God that includes his wisdom, power, mercy, unfailing love for us,
etc.
We need to be intimate with him. And this is something that we have to
understand well, because many people are afraid to go intimate with
God. They feel awkward about it. They sometimes think it is unnatural,
inhuman, unmanly. The only intimacy they know is of the sexual kind,
which is a completely reduced if not erroneous understanding of
intimacy.
Our heart is meant to enter into intimate relations, but of the proper
kind, first with God and then with God, following his commandments,
with everybody else. Our heart has to overflow with affections. That’s
what is proper of it. Intimacy is what truly humanizes our heart,
opening it to its divinization in God and in our love for others.
So, let’s ask ourselves, where is our heart? Let’s win it for God!
No comments:
Post a Comment