501 VOCAL PRAYER

YOUCAT Lesson 501

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

501  What is vocal prayer?

In the first place prayer is lifting the heart to God.  And yet Jesus himself taught his disciples to pray with words.  With the Our Father he left us the perfect vocal prayer as his testament to show how we should pray.  [2700-2704, 2722]

The Boston Black Catholic Choir at Stonehill College bring a special spirit of celebration to the Chapel of Mary.  As their songs of praise rang out to the Lord the congregation joined in.  …..501

While praying we should not try to think pious thoughts.  We should express what is in our hearts and offer it to God as complaint, petition, praise, and thanks.  Often it is the great vocal prayers—the Psalms and hymns of Sacred Scripture, the Our Father, the Hail Mary—that direct us to the true substance of prayer and lead to a kind of free, interior prayer.  511-527

 [2700-2704, 2722]

 VOCAL PRAYER

2700 Through his Word, God speaks to man. By words, mental or vocal, our prayer takes flesh. Yet it is most important that the heart should be present to him to whom we are speaking in prayer: "Whether or not our prayer is heard depends not on the number of words, but on the fervor of our souls."(  St. John Chrysostom, Ecloga de oratione 2:Patrologia Graeca 63,585.)² --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

2701 Vocal prayer is an essential element of the Christian life. To his disciples, drawn by their Master's silent prayer, Jesus teaches a vocal prayer, the Our Father. He not only prayed aloud the liturgical prayers of the synagogue but, as the Gospels show, he raised his voice to express his personal prayer, from exultant blessing of the Father to the agony of Gesthemani.( Compare Matthew 11:25-26; Mark 14:36.)³ –CCC

2702 The need to involve the senses in interior prayer corresponds to a requirement of our human nature. We are body and spirit, and we experience the need to translate our feelings externally. We must pray with our whole being to give all power possible to our supplication. –CCC

2703 This need also corresponds to a divine requirement. God seeks worshippers in Spirit and in Truth, and consequently living prayer that rises from the depths of the soul. He also wants the external expression that associates the body with interior prayer, for it renders him that perfect homage which is his due. –CCC

2704 Because it is external and so thoroughly human, vocal prayer is the form of prayer most readily accessible to groups. Even interior prayer, however, cannot neglect vocal prayer. Prayer is internalized to the extent that we become aware of him "to whom we speak;"( St. Teresa of Jesus, The Way of Perfection 26,9 in The Collected Works of St. Teresa of Avila, tr. K. Kavanaugh, OCD, and O. Rodriguez, OCD (Washington DC: Institute of Carmelite Studies, 1980),II,136.)⁴ Thus vocal prayer becomes an initial form of contemplative prayer. --CCC