494 AT THE WELLSPRINGS OF PRAYER

YOUCAT Lesson 494

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

494  How can my everyday routine be a school of prayer?

Everything that happens, every encounter can become the occasion for a prayer.  For the more deeply we live in union with God. The deeper we understand the world around us.  [2659-2660]

The earth is the LORD’s and all it holds, the world and those who dwell in it.  Autumn carpeting in Rose’s backyard near Rhinelander.  Ferns and red maple leaves photo by Don L. Bragg.  …..494

Someone who already seeks union with Jesus in the morning can be a blessing to the people he meets, even his opponents and enemies.  Over the course of the day he casts all his cares on the Lord.  He has more peace within himself and radiates it.  He makes his judgments and decisions by asking himself how Jesus would act at that moment.  He overcomes fear by staying close to God.  In desperate situations he is not without support.  He carries the peace of heaven within him and thereby brings it into the world.  He is full of gratitude and joy for the beautiful things, but also endures the difficult things that he encounters.  This attentiveness to God is possible even at work.

 “My secret is quite simple: I pray.  And through my prayer I become one with the love of Christ and see that praying is loving him, that praying is living with him, and that means making his words come true…For me, praying means being one with the will of Jesus twenty-four hours a day, living for him, through him, and with him.”  Blessed Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997)

 [2659-2660]

 AT THE WELLSPRINGS OF PRAYER

2659 We learn to pray at certain moments by hearing the Word of the Lord and sharing in his Paschal mystery, but his Spirit is offered us at all times, in the events of each day, to make prayer spring up from us. Jesus' teaching about praying to our Father is in the same vein as his teaching about providence(Compare Matthew 6:11,34.)¹² : time is in the Father's hands; it is in the present that we encounter him, not yesterday nor tomorrow, but today: "O that today you would hearken to his voice! Harden not your hearts.”( Psalm 95:7-8.)¹³ --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

2660 Prayer in the events of each day and each moment is one of the secrets of the kingdom revealed to "little children," to the servants of Christ, to the poor of the Beatitudes. It is right and good to pray so that the coming of the kingdom of justice and peace may influence the march of history, but it is just as important to bring the help of prayer into humble, everyday situations; all forms of prayer can be the leaven to which the Lord compares the kingdom.( Compare Luke 13:20-21.)¹⁴ --CCC