Homily 17th Sunday of Ordinary Time - July 24, 2022

 Readings can be found here.

            Lord, teach us to pray.  Our Catholic tradition is rich in prayer.  There are numerous ways we can pray.  There are formal prayers like the rosary, the liturgy of the hours, novenas, etc.  There are prayers to the saints for intercession.  There are informal prayers that we offer up for any number of reasons.  We can find a variety books on how to pray or to deepen our prayer life.  It can seem rather complicated at times with all the choices.  Two weeks ago, Father Joe reminded us in his homily that our faith is simple.  Love God, love our neighbor, follow the commandments, focus on Jesus. Today, Jesus teaches us how to pray and what to pray for about as simply as can be.

            One of the disciples asks Jesus to teach them to pray.  Jesus gives us what we now call the Our Father or the Lord’s Prayer.  We’re more familiar with the longer version in the Gospel of Matthew.  Luke’s version is shorter and simpler.  We acknowledge God as Father.  God loves us as a parent loves their child.  Like children, we should look to God for our needs.  We recognize that God is holy and deserves our praise.  We pray that God’s will be done.  We do this BEFORE we pray for anything for ourselves.  Only after asking for the coming of God’s kingdom do we ask for what we need for the day.  Not what we necessarily want, but what we NEED today.  Next we pray for God’s mercy for our sins.  We’re also reminded to be merciful to others and forgive them for sinning against us.  Finally, we pray to God for strength against temptation.

            How often have we prayed the Lord’s Prayer, either the longer or shorter version?  It’s so familiar to us that we almost don’t think about it.  Perhaps we should.  When we pray as Jesus taught, do we pay attention to what we’re saying?  Luke’s version has only six lines.  Each line is a prayer in itself.  God is holy and deserves our worship and praise.  May God’s will be done.  Give us what we need for today.  Forgive our sins.  Help us forgive others.  Give us strength not to sin.  When praying the Lord’s Prayer, consider reflecting for a few moments on each line before going to the next.  It’s an opportunity to listen to God respond to us as we pray.  What might God be trying to tell us?

            We can look at the Lord’s Prayer in other ways also.  The Gospels give us the prayer in the plural: OUR Father, give US our daily bread.  Forgive OUR sins.  When we pray in this way, we’re praying not only for ourselves, but others.  Who in our lives needs our prayers today?  However, we can make the prayer intimately personal.  Try changing the pronouns to MY.  My Father, give ME my daily bread, forgive MY sins as I forgive others.  Or perhaps we want to pray for a specific person.  Give my Joe his daily bread.  Forgive my sins as I forgive Susie.  We’re called to pray continuously.  We can pray a particular line from the Lord’s Prayer when we need it.  When we’re struggling with a decision, we can simply pray Father, hallowed be your name.  Your kingdom come.

            Our faith is simple.  Love God and neighbor, follow God’s commandments, focus on Jesus.  Jesus taught us that praying is simple.  Jesus gives us six lines that covers all we need to pray for.  We can use this prayer in any number of ways.  Though simple, it’s an extremely powerful prayer.  How can we use this simple prayer to change our lives and deepen our faith?


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