517 WE ARE CALLED TO PEACEFUL, CONSIDERATE LOVE OF OUR NEIGHBOR

AVE MARIA

YOUCAT Lesson 517

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

517  How are we changed by the Our Father?

The Our Father allows us to discover joyfully that we are the children of one Father.  Our common vocation is to praise our Father and to live together as though “of one heart and soul” (Acts of the Apostles 4:32).  [2787-2791, 2801]

Suffer the Children by Carl Heinrich Bloch, 1834-1890 (compare Matthew 19:14  and John 14:8-11)..... 517

Because God the Father loves each of his children with the same exclusive love, as though we were the only object of his devotion, we too must get along together in a completely new way: peacefully, full of consideration and love, so that each one can be the awe-inspiring miracle that he actually is in God’s sight.  61, 280

“All creatures are children of the one Father and therefore brothers.”  St. Francis of Assisi (1182-1226)

“The Christian does not say ‘my Father’ but ‘our Father’, even in the secrecy of a closed room, because he knows that in every place, on every occasion, he is a member of one and the same Body.”  Pope Benedict XVI, June 6, 2007

 “In the Lord’s Prayer we say all together, ‘Our Father’.  So says the emperor, the beggar, the slave, the master.  They are all brothers, because they have one Father.”  St. Augustine (354-430)

  [2787-2791, 2801]

"OUR" FATHER

2787 When we say "our" Father, we recognize first that all his promises of love announced by the prophets are fulfilled in the new and eternal covenant in his Christ: we have become "his" people and he is henceforth "our" God. This new relationship is the purely gratuitous gift of belonging to each other: we are to respond to "grace and truth" given us in Jesus Christ with love and faithfulness.( John 1:17; compare Hosea 2:21-22; Hos 6:1-6.)⁴⁵ –Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

 2788 Since the Lord's Prayer is that of his people in the "end-time," this "our" also expresses the certitude of our hope in God's ultimate promise: in the new Jerusalem he will say to the victor, "I will be his God and he shall be my son."( Revelation 21:7.)⁴⁶  --CCC

 2789 When we pray to "our" Father, we personally address the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. By doing so we do not divide the Godhead, since the Father is its "source and origin," but rather confess that the Son is eternally begotten by him and the Holy Spirit proceeds from him. We are not confusing the persons, for we confess that our communion is with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ, in their one Holy Spirit. The Holy Trinity is consubstantial and indivisible. When we pray to the Father, we adore and glorify him together with the Son and the Holy Spirit. –CCC

 2790 Grammatically, "our" qualifies a reality common to more than one person. There is only one God, and he is recognized as Father by those who, through faith in his only Son, are reborn of him by water and the Spirit.( Compare 1 John 5:1; Jn 3:5.)⁴⁷ The Church is this new communion of God and men. United with the only Son, who has become "the firstborn among many brethren," she is in communion with one and the same Father in one and the same Holy Spirit.( Romans 8:29; Compare Ephesians 4:4-6.)⁴⁸ In praying "our" Father, each of the baptized is praying in this communion: "The company of those who believed were of one heart and soul."( Acts of the Apostles 4:32.)⁴⁹ –CCC

 2791 For this reason, in spite of the divisions among Christians, this prayer to "our" Father remains our common patrimony and an urgent summons for all the baptized. In communion by faith in Christ and by Baptism, they ought to join in Jesus' prayer for the unity of his disciples.( Compare Unitatia Rredintegratio 8; 22.)⁵⁰ –CCC

 IN BRIEF

 2801 When we say "Our" Father, we are invoking the new covenant in Jesus Christ, communion with the Holy Trinity, and the divine love which spreads through the Church to encompass the world. --CCC