Driveway Tourism Sign:
“Trappists knpwn for prayer, manual labor and silence. “
Let’s hear from the successful peple – sanctity is only success
What do Saints say about prayer? How important?
Blessed RafaeL: (Died 1938)
Util u are convinced that prayer is the best use of your time, you’ll never find time for prayer.”
Alph Ligouri: If we pray, we’ll be saved, if we don’t we won’t.
Ter Avila: There is one road that reaches God, the road of prayer. If anyone shows you another road, u’re being deceived.
Pope St Greg Great: “By asking, men become disposed to receive what God from all Eternity is already disposed to give.”
Thos Aquin: We pray, not to change Providence, but to align ourselves with it.
Card New: When you pray u’ll find enouf defects in your praying to keep u humble, to remind u of your nothingness, to keeep u from pride as you aim at perfection.
Ter Avila: We skip over prayr today becuz we have a headache,
tomorrow becuz we had a headache, and the next day becuz we’re afraid we’ll get one.
All of this is encouragement
never met anyone: who claimed I’m satisfied with myprayer;
we all have probs
We usually begin by Defining Prayer: talking with God, conversation
It can be a monologue …. whre we do all th talking
Instead, let’s ask: What pleases God?
Make a list: top of hierarchy?
Our CATECHISM: The Life, death, resurrection of Christ is the acceptabe sacrifice which brings salvation to the whole world …
So most pleases God mos is…
The Mass: it’s God’s prayer, we join in it, we can’t botch it up
Thank God for ex opere operato
best priest can off the Mass, worst priest can offer the Mass,
it can offered on mybest day, or on my worst day
it still is what pleases God the most.
Carthage: Bishop Donatus: minister must be “worthy” to celebrate the Sacraments , caused a schism,
Donatists: 4-5th cent purityof minister determined validityof sacraments Condemned by St Augustine
Bishops formulated a dictum:
If Peter celebrates Mass, , it’s Jesus celebrating Mass,
if Juda Celebrates Mass, it’s Jesus celebrating Mass… ..
Mass is what pleases God the most
Next in hierarchy: Liturgy of Hours, Div Office. How import?
Our OSB Tradition: Prefer nothing whatsoever to the Workof God.
Mary Mag de Pazzi Carm Prioriess d 1607 Florence:
in her communiity a sister was gifted with levitations – get light, rise upward, vision
Q: If I’m up ther & bell rings for choir, may I be excused?
A: I Don’t know what’s going on up there, don’t know what it is.
DO KNOW what’s happening down here,,, truly Prayer… so come on down and join us.
Church so insistent on Div Off : no new rel comm been founded that doesnn’t have at least the main hours as part of daily pray
St Aug: In Psalter, God puts on our ips the words he wants to hear.
They say we praying for the whole church:
St Basil: vox ecclesiae, voice of the church,
St Bernardine of Siena: os totius ecclesiae- mouth of the whole church. Thast’s what we are, praying for the whole church
Yes, our Div Office is important prayer.
Blessed Avbbot Columba Marmion told his monks:
for a Benedictine, day without Div Off is a day lost
What’s next in the hierarchy of prayer that’s pleasing to God?
For us, it’s LECTIO, built into the schedule,
with the possibilityof lectio moving to meditatio, and becoming contemplatio. We get involved with the Word of God, or an author who explains the Word of God.
Lectio is ours, we own it, that’s our life,
it’s in the Rule, the Constitutions, our Customary.
And there’s more.
After The Eucharist, the Divine Office, and Lectio, it’s our choice of prayer by inspiration. We’re all different. Blessed Abbot Columba Marmion made the Stations of the Cross, every day, every day except Easter. Our private prayer is whatever devotion or formula we choose to fulfil what Scripture say: Pray always.
Once you estaablish that prayer is such a good thing,
you have to name its enemies which throw up roadblocks to slow us down.
My perssoanl list include:s Distractions, Work, and Dozing, whcih come in different ways on different days.
Distractions because there’s so much going on in our minds and arund us. Distract cause us to get frust, disappoint, make us think of giving up
It’s easy to say: I can’t pray the way I used to, the way I want to.
Once again, Blessed Abbot Columba Marmion has the answer:
“Don’t pray as u used to But pray, Pray as you can, not as you can’t Remember: the less you pray, the worse it gets.
In a Q/A in the SUMMA:
Thos Aquin: Even the holiest of men suffer from a wandering of the mind when they pray.the human mind is unable to rmain aloft for a long period of time because of our weak nature, our weaknesses weigh us down to inferior things, The key, he says, is our intention Attention is necessary in our original intention,
we have to intend to pray, to fix our minds on God. But if our minds wander,
the force of that origina intention renders the whole prayer meritorious
Make The Morning Offering – repeat it thruout the day
Work can be another thing that separates us from prayer,
Even though the Desert Fathers wove baskets and prayed simultaneouldly,
even some of tho Rance lectlures were on Prayer/Work together,
WORK can become tail that wags our dog
5-min bell rings, I think: I can still get in just this one last thing
or we rush into Choir, our mind still on the work we left behind.
Fr Timothy: we can hire workers to do the wrapping and shipping
we cannot hire people to chant the praises of God.
That’s our job, we’re the monks
Good place to repeat:
Util u are convinced that prayer is the best use of your time, you’ll never find time for prayer.”
Dozing: old man’s syndrome
problem is: What do you miss? You’ll never come this way again!
Cure of Ars Devil asssigned 3 helped: Attack Christians today
1st : I found a ship of pilgrims going to Rome, called up a big storm, sank the ship, all the pilgrims died before getting to Rome
Devil: No good. You destroyed the bodies, not the souls!
2nd: I corraled a group of Christians into the arena, attacked by lions, chewed to bits, horrible deaths seen by the crowd
Devil: No good. You destroyed the bodies, not the souls!
3rd: Icrept into a Church full of worshippers,
cast a deep sleep over all of them
they missed all the prayers … THEY MISSED EVERYTHIBG!
Devil: jumping up and down, hooting and hollering: That’s it!
That’s the idea! Give than one a promotion!!
They missed all the prayers …
Bros, We came to be men of prayer. We’ve joined a particular life that sets us on a course of prayer: it’s all spelled out for us:
community prayer, with the Eucharist and the Dvine Office, private prayer
Ther’s not much reason for being monks if we’re not men of prayer. It’s not a mnasteryif you don’t have prayaer,
There’s very little we can contribute to the community if we don’t pray, because prayer changes us, Thaat’s our vow.
We heard The successful people say the only way that leads to God is prayer,
prayer is what willl get us to heaven,
it has to be our ifrst responsibility.