Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Prayer, by Fr. Jack Farley, SVD

The only way to pray is to pray; and the way to pray well is to pray much. If one has no time for this, then one must at least pray regularly. But the less one prays, the worse it goes. (Dom John Chapman)
 Prayer is prayer, no matter how limited in scope. It is a wedge that will, in time, open our heart wider to the divine reality. Its narrow edge allows it to penetrate more easily.
Because our behavior spills over to our attitude towards God, prayer is subjected to the ramifications of bad habits in our daily life. I am not suggesting that prayer will be impossible until all our current sins cease. On the contrary, prayer cohabits quite happily with sin. What prayer cannot abide, however, is failure to recognize sin. Efforts to rationalize our behavior effectively prevents prayer. Sin admitted and confessed renews our sense of dependence on God and fuels our prayer.

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