514 THE PRAYER OF THE CHURCH

YOUCAT Lesson 514

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

514  What position does the Our Father hold among prayers?

 

The Our Father is “the most perfect prayer” (St. Thomas Aquinas) and the “summary of the whole Gospel” (Tertullian).  [2761-2772, 2774, 2776]

Making the Our Father come true through the baptism of newly borne Don C. Bragg.  Left to right: daughter Lisa, aunt Irma (Voss) Linskey, uncle Charles Bayer and the parents Don L. and RoseMarie Bragg. …..514

 The Our Father is more than a prayer—it is a path that leads directly into the heart of our Father.  The early Christians recited this original prayer of the Church three times each day and which is entrusted to every Christian at Baptism.  We, too, should not let a day pass without trying to recite the Lord’s Prayer with our lips, to take it to heart, and to make it come true in our lives.

 “Let us pray therefore, dearest brethren, as God, the Master, has taught us.  It is an intimate and fervent prayer, when we pray to God with what is his, when we make Christ’s prayer ascend to his ears.  May the Father recognize again the words of his Son when we recite a prayer…Consider that we stand in the sight of God.”  St. Cyprian of Carthage  (200-258)

 [2761-2772, 2774, 2776]

"THE SUMMARY OF THE WHOLE GOSPEL"

2761 The Lord's Prayer "is truly the summary of the whole gospel."( Tertullian, De orat. 1:Patrologia Latina 1,1155.)⁷ "Since the Lord . . . after handing over the practice of prayer, said elsewhere, 'Ask and you will receive,' and since everyone has petitions which are peculiar to his circumstances, the regular and appropriate prayer [the Lord's Prayer] is said first, as the foundation of further desires."( Tertullian, De orat. 10:PL 1,1165; compare Luke 11:9.)⁸ --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

I. AT THE CENTER OF THE SCRIPTURES

2762 After showing how the psalms are the principal food of Christian prayer and flow together in the petitions of the Our Father, St. Augustine concludes:

Run through all the words of the holy prayers [in Scripture], and I do not think that you will find anything in them that is not contained and included in the Lord's Prayer.( St. Augustine, Ep. 130,12,22:Patrologia Latina 33,503.)⁹ –CCC

2763 All the Scriptures - the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms - are fulfilled in Christ.( Compare Luke 24:44.)¹⁰ The Gospel is this "Good News." Its first proclamation is summarized by St. Matthew in the Sermon on the Mount(Compare Matthew 5-7.);¹¹ the prayer to our Father is at the center of this proclamation. It is in this context that each petition bequeathed to us by the Lord is illuminated:  

The Lord's Prayer is the most perfect of prayers. . . . In it we ask, not only for all the things we can rightly desire, but also in the sequence that they should be desired. This prayer not only teaches us to ask for things, but also in what order we should desire them.( St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae II-II,83,9.)¹² –CCC

2764 The Sermon on the Mount is teaching for life, the Our Father is a prayer; but in both the one and the other the Spirit of the Lord gives new form to our desires, those inner movements that animate our lives. Jesus teaches us this new life by his words; he teaches us to ask for it by our prayer. The rightness of our life in him will depend on the rightness of our prayer.  –CCC

II. THE LORD'S PRAYER

2765 The traditional expression "the Lord's Prayer" - oratio Dominica - means that the prayer to our Father is taught and given to us by the Lord Jesus. The prayer that comes to us from Jesus is truly unique: it is "of the Lord." On the one hand, in the words of this prayer the only Son gives us the words the Father gave him(Compare John 17:7.)¹³ he is the master of our prayer. On the other, as Word incarnate, he knows in his human heart the needs of his human brothers and sisters and reveals them to us: he is the model of our prayer.  –CCC

2766 But Jesus does not give us a formula to repeat mechanically.( Compare Matthew 6:7; 1 Kings 18:26-29)¹⁴ As in every vocal prayer, it is through the Word of God that the Holy Spirit teaches the children of God to pray to their Father. Jesus not only gives us the words of our filial prayer; at the same time he gives us the Spirit by whom these words become in us "spirit and life."( John 6:63.)¹⁵ Even more, the proof and possibility of our filial prayer is that the Father "sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!'"( Galatians 4:6.)¹⁶ Since our prayer sets forth our desires before God, it is again the Father, "he who searches the hearts of men," who "knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God."( Romans 8:27.)¹⁷ The prayer to Our Father is inserted into the mysterious mission of the Son and of the Spirit.  –CCC

III. THE PRAYER OF THE CHURCH

2767 This indivisible gift of the Lord's words and of the Holy Spirit who gives life to them in the hearts of believers has been received and lived by the Church from the beginning. The first communities prayed the Lord's Prayer three times a day,( Compare Didache 8,3:Sources Chretiennes 248,174.)¹⁸ in place of the "Eighteen Benedictions" customary in Jewish piety.  –CCC

2768 According to the apostolic tradition, the Lord's Prayer is essentially rooted in liturgical prayer: 

[The Lord] teaches us to make prayer in common for all our brethren. For he did not say "my Father" who art in heaven, but "our" Father, offering petitions for the common body.( St. John Chrysostom, Homr. in Matthew. 19,4:Patrologia Gaeca 57,278.)¹⁹ –CCC

In all the liturgical traditions, the Lord's Prayer is an integral part of the major hours of the Divine Office. In the three sacraments of Christian initiation its ecclesial character is especially in evidence:  –CCC

2769 In Baptism and Confirmation, the handing on (traditio) of the Lord's Prayer signifies new birth into the divine life. Since Christian prayer is our speaking to God with the very word of God, those who are "born anew". . . through the living and abiding word of God"(1 Pet 1:23.)²⁰ learn to invoke their Father by the one Word he always hears. They can henceforth do so, for the seal of the Holy Spirit's anointing is indelibly placed on their hearts, ears, lips, indeed their whole filial being. This is why most of the patristic commentaries on the Our Father are addressed to catechumens and neophytes. When the Church prays the Lord's Prayer, it is always the people made up of the "new-born" who pray and obtain mercy.( Compare 1 Pet 2:1-10.)²¹ –CCC

2770 In the Eucharistic liturgy the Lord's Prayer appears as the prayer of the whole Church and there reveals its full meaning and efficacy. Placed between the anaphora (the Eucharistic prayer) and the communion, the Lord's Prayer sums up on the one hand all the petitions and intercessions expressed in the movement of the epiclesis and, on the other, knocks at the door of the Banquet of the kingdom which sacramental communion   anticipates. –CCC

2771 In the Eucharist, the Lord's Prayer also reveals the eschatological character of its petitions. It is the proper prayer of "the end-time," the time of salvation that began with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and will be fulfilled with the Lord's return. The petitions addressed to our Father, as distinct from the prayers of the old covenant, rely on the mystery of salvation already accomplished, once for all, in Christ crucified and risen.  –CCC

2772 From this unshakeable faith springs forth the hope that sustains each of the seven petitions, which express the groanings of the present age, this time of patience and expectation during which "it does not yet appear what we shall be."( 1 John 3:2; compare Colossians 3:4.)²² The Eucharist and the Lord's Prayer look eagerly for the Lord's return, "until he comes."( 1 Corinthians 11:26.)²³ –CCC

IN BRIEF

2774 "The Lord's Prayer is truly the summary of the whole gospel,"( Tertullian, De orat. 1:Patrologia Latina 1,1251-1255.)²⁴ the "most perfect of prayers."( St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae II-II,83,9.)²⁵ It is at the center of the Scriptures. –CCC

2776 The Lord's Prayer is the quintessential prayer of the Church. It is an integral part of the major hours of the Divine Office and of the sacraments of Christian initiation: Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist. Integrated into the Eucharist it reveals the eschatological character of its petitions, hoping for the Lord, "until he comes" (1 Corinthians 11:26).