469 PRAYER

YOUCAT Lesson 469

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

How We Should Pray:  Prayer in Christian Life

469  What is prayer?

Prayer is turning the heart toward God.  When a person prays, he enters into a living relationship with God.  [2558-2565]

Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane by Heinrich Hofmann.  .....469

Prayer is the great gate leading into faith.  Someone who prays no longer lives on his own, for himself, and by his own strength.  He knows there is a God to whom he can talk.  People who pray entrust themselves more and more to God.  Even now they seek union with the one whom they will encounter one day face to face.  Therefore, the effort to pray daily is part of Christian life.  Of course, one cannot learn to pray in the same way one learns a technique.  As strange as it sounds, prayer is a gift one obtains through prayer.

“For me, prayer is a surge of the heart; it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy.”  St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897)

  

“The desire to pray is already a prayer.”  Georges Bernanos (1888-1948, French writer)

 [2558-2565]

PRAYER IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

2558 "Great is the mystery of the faith!" The Church professes this mystery in the Apostles' Creed (Part One) and celebrates it in the sacramental liturgy (Part Two), so that the life of the faithful may be conformed to Christ in the Holy Spirit to the glory of God the Father (Part Three). This mystery, then, requires that the faithful believe in it, that they celebrate it, and that they live from it in a vital and personal relationship with the living and true God. This relationship is prayer. --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition 

WHAT IS PRAYER?

For me, prayer is a surge of the heart; it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy.( St. ThéRèse of Lisieux, Manuscrits autobiographiques, C 25r.)¹ –CCC

Prayer as God's gift

2559 "Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God."( St. John Damascene, Defide orth. 3,24:Patrologia Graeca 94,1089C.)² But when we pray, do we speak from the height of our pride and will, or "out of the depths" of a humble and contrite heart?( Psalm 130:1.)³ He who humbles himself will be exalted;( Compare Luke 18:9-14.)⁴ humility is the foundation of prayer, Only when we humbly acknowledge that "we do not know how to pray as we ought,"(Romans 8:26.)⁵ are we ready to receive freely the gift of prayer. "Man is a beggar before God."(St. Augustine, Sermo 56,6,9:Patrologia Latina 38,381.)⁶ –CCC

2560 "If you knew the gift of God!"(John 4:10.)⁷ The wonder of prayer is revealed beside the well where we come seeking water: there, Christ comes to meet every human being. It is he who first seeks us and asks us for a drink. Jesus thirsts; his asking arises from the depths of God's desire for us. Whether we realize it or not, prayer is the encounter of God's thirst with ours. God thirsts that we may thirst for him.(Compare St. Augustine, De diversis quaestionibus octoginta tribus 64,4:PL 40,56.)⁸ –CCC

2561 "You would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."(John 4:10.)⁹ Paradoxically our prayer of petition is a response to the plea of the living God: "They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewn out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water!"(Jeremiah 2:13.)¹⁰ Prayer is the response of faith to the free promise of salvation and also a response of love to the thirst of the only Son of God.( Compare John 7:37-39; Jn 19:28; Isaiah 12:3; Isa 51:1; Zechariah 12:10; Zech13:1.)¹¹ --CCC

Prayer as covenant

2562 Where does prayer come from? Whether prayer is expressed in words or gestures, it is the whole man who prays. But in naming the source of prayer, Scripture speaks sometimes of the soul or the spirit, but most often of the heart (more than a thousand times). According to Scripture, it is the heart that prays. If our heart is far from God, the words of prayer are in vain. --CCC

2563 The heart is the dwelling-place where I am, where I live; according to the Semitic or Biblical expression, the heart is the place "to which I withdraw." The heart is our hidden center, beyond the grasp of our reason and of others; only the Spirit of God can fathom the human heart and know it fully. The heart is the place of decision, deeper than our psychic drives. It is the place of truth, where we choose life or death. It is the place of encounter, because as image of God we live in relation: it is the place of covenant. --CCC

2564 Christian prayer is a covenant relationship between God and man in Christ. It is the action of God and of man, springing forth from both the Holy Spirit and ourselves, wholly directed to the Father, in union with the human will of the Son of God made man. --CCC

Prayer as communion

2565 In the New Covenant, prayer is the living relationship of the children of God with their Father who is good beyond measure, with his Son Jesus Christ and with the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Kingdom is "the union of the entire holy and royal Trinity . . . with the whole human spirit."( St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Oratio, 16,9:PG 35,945.)¹² Thus, the life of prayer is the habit of being in the presence of the thrice-holy God and in communion with him. This communion of life is always possible because, through Baptism, we have already been united with Christ.( Compare Romans 6:5.)¹³ Prayer is Christian insofar as it is communion with Christ and extends throughout the Church, which is his Body. Its dimensions are those of Christ's love.( Compare Ephesians 3:18-21.)¹⁴ --CCC