Sunday Gospel Reflection: Humility In Prayer

 

“Two people went up to the temple area to pray; one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee took up his position and spoke this prayer to himself, ‘O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity—greedy, dishonest, adulterous—or even like this tax collector.’” Luke 18:10–11

What a sad prayer. Of course it wasn’t even a prayer to God since the Pharisee “spoke this prayer to himself.” The prayer of the tax collector, however, was a perfect model for all prayer. We read that the tax collector “stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.’” Which prayer more resembles your own prayer?

To honestly answer that question, let’s examine both prayers. First of all, the contrast of these two prayers is a contrast between humility and pride. The Pharisee was clearly full of pride. Pride blinds us from true self-knowledge. Saint Teresa of Ávila teaches us that the very first thing we must do on our journey to God is obtain self-knowledge through humility. Without that, we will never grow in holiness.

The sin of pride is obvious in the prayer of the Pharisee and, therefore, his lack of true self-knowledge is also evident. Note that even his physical posture of standing depicts pride. Throughout the Scriptures, kneeling, or even falling prostrate, is the disposition of the humble. In addition to standing, the Pharisee’s prayer was a list of his own goodness. He very well may have fasted twice a week and paid tithes on his whole income. But his prayer suggests that he did this by his own effort. He did not ascribe those acts to the grace and strength of God, which means they were not true acts of charity. His prayer suggests that he doesn’t need God in order to do good. This is also seen in the fact that he asks nothing of God. Instead, he simply thanks God for how good he is through his own effort. The result is that God gives him nothing, since he asked for nothing.

True prayer must begin with the humble recognition of our weakness and need for God. The tax collector expressed this humility by bowing his head to the ground, not even daring to look up to Heaven. This reveals he did not consider himself worthy of God’s grace. Truth be told, he wasn’t worthy of it. That’s why God’s grace is a mercy. It is all mercy in that He bestows that which we are not worthy to receive. And He only bestows it on those who know they are not worthy of it. The words spoken by the tax collector are the perfect model of prayer because his words depict these truths. As a sinner, he doesn’t deserve mercy but begs for God’s grace as an act of God’s mercy.

When you pray, how do you pray? What is the disposition of your heart and for what do you pray? Begin by considering the physical position in which you pray. Though we can pray standing, sitting, kneeling or even lying down, there is something very good about kneeling or even lying prostrate. It doesn’t mean we have to do so the entire time we pray, but it is a good practice to kneel, bow your head or fall down prostrate before God at least for a moment each day. Do you do this? If not, consider making this a daily habit.

When you pray, do you begin your prayer with humility? We begin the Mass by examining our conscience and confessing our sins. This is a good example of how to begin your prayer every time you pray. Humble yourself by calling to mind your sins and weaknesses. Confess them to God and acknowledge the fact that, because of your sins, you are unworthy of God’s mercy. Humility like this will help you to see yourself as God sees you, and this will help you open yourself to the grace you need from God to grow in holiness.

Reflect, today, upon the humility found in the prayer of this tax collector. As you do, look at your own practice of prayer and discern whether you imitate this tax collector’s disposition and prayer. Try to commit to physically humbling yourself before our Lord every day. Kneel, bow your head, or fall down prostrate every day. When you do pray, beg for mercy as one who doesn’t deserve anything from God. This is the humble truth on which all prayer must be based. The more you can humble yourself this way, the more God will lift you up and pour forth His mercy upon you.

O God, be merciful to me, a sinner. I bow before You, most glorious and merciful God. I offer You my praise and gratitude for Your abundant mercy in my life. I am not worthy of You and Your grace, but You bestow it anyway. For that I thank You with profound gratitude and beg for the ongoing gift of Your grace. Jesus, I trust in You.

Sunday Gospel Reflection: Praying For More Than Our Needs

 

As Jesus continued his journey to Jerusalem, he traveled through Samaria and Galilee. As he was entering a village, ten lepers met him. They stood at a distance from him and raised their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master! Have pity on us!” Luke 17:11–13

This story begins very well for all ten of these lepers. For nine of them, it ends tragically. For one, it ends in an even better and more glorious way than it began.

The lepers represent us all. Their illness was a symbol of all sin and the consequences of sin. When the disease began, the lepers began to experience the effects of their disease. Discolored and thick dry skin, sores, and rashes would set in. Once detected, each leper was removed from the community to stop the spread of the disease and was only free to associate with other lepers. They no longer could gather freely with their loved ones as the lepers entered isolation and shame. Analogously, all sin has similar effects. Sin causes pain within our souls as we discover the growing wounds it causes. Sin affects our relationships and our ability to freely relate to those whom we love.

The initial cure for sin is simple. We cry out, “Jesus, Master! Have pity on me!” But that is only the first step. By curing the lepers, Jesus was showing us that He had power over our sin. He could forgive us and will forgive us when we seek His mercy. But forgiveness will end in tragedy if it does not lead us to faith and to a following of the will of God with zeal and determination. If we take the forgiveness of sins for granted, then we will be in an even more miserable state than before. The nine lepers who failed to return and give thanks to God represent those who do not convert their lives when touched by God’s merciful hand.

This story highlights the importance of our response to God when He does touch us. We must glorify God with a loud voice, fall on our knees before Him and express our deepest gratitude. When the one leper does this, Jesus says to him, “Stand up and go; your faith has saved you.” That mercy from our Lord was a mercy that touched his soul. It imparted the gift of faith and enabled this man to go forth and be healed with eternal graces.

Too often we turn to God in prayer only when we have a problem. Then, once the problem is taken care of, we pay little to no attention to our Lord. God’s role in our lives is not to fix our problems so that we can then go about our daily lives as normal. His mercy must evoke ongoing and profound gratitude. Gratitude to God is nothing other than an acknowledgement of the truth. We owe everything to God. Without Him, we are nothing. We are dead in our sins. Just one leper realized this and was blessed with the gift of faith that saved not only his body, but also his soul.

Reflect, today, upon the ways in which you turn to God in prayer. It is good to come to Him with your needs and problems. It is good to cry out “Jesus, Master! Have pity on me!” It is good to come to Him as the Physician of your soul and the source of healing you need. But that is not enough. In fact, if you stop there in your life of prayer, you will end in a most miserable state. You will be using God for your selfish advantage. Reflect upon whether you are able to take the next and most important step in faith. Do you come to Him when all is well? Do you praise Him with all your might for all that He has done for you? Do you fall on your knees before Him with the deepest gratitude in your heart? Reflect upon your prayer and seek to imitate this one leper. If you do, your faith will also save you and our Lord will invite you to rise and go forth, healed in the truest way possible.

Most merciful Lord, You are able to do all things. You are able to heal all my wounds, forgive my sins and solve every problem I encounter. As I cry out to You in my need, please do heal me. In response, may I always turn back to You with the deepest gratitude and praise so that my faith in You will grow and my love for You will truly flourish. Jesus, I trust in You.

Sunday Gospel Reflection: Nourished By Faith

 

The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.” The Lord replied, “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” Luke 17:5–6

Is it possible to completely uproot a tree and plant it in the sea? It’s certainly hard to imagine how. It is especially hard to imagine doing so with a simple command of faith. Uprooting a tree is hard enough to imagine, but it is even more difficult to imagine a tree being planted in the sea. Though water is necessary, one cannot plant a tree in the sea and expect it to grow. But that’s partly the point. We often underestimate the power of true faith. Saint Matthew’s Gospel says that faith can move mountains. Saint Luke’s says it can uproot a tree and replant it in the sea. All it takes to do so is faith the size of a mustard seed.

How much faith is equal to a mustard seed? A mustard seed is small, very small. It measures only about one millimeter in length. People who worked the soil at that time would have known that it was among the smallest of seeds they planted. For that reason, Jesus uses this familiar image to teach the apostles that faith, even a little faith, is powerful.

Jesus’ teaching comes in response to a prayer on the part of the apostles. “Increase our faith,” they said. Jesus’ response, inviting them to have only a little faith, implies that their faith was quite weak. To increase their faith to the size of a mustard seed suggests that they did not even have a little faith yet. Most likely they were aware of that fact, and that was the reason they asked Jesus to increase their faith. They perceived their lacking and turned to Him Who could help.

One of the first steps to increasing faith is to humbly admit our lack of faith. In our pride, we often want to convince ourselves and others that we are filled with faith. But if that were the case, God would be doing incredible things through us. He would be doing that which is otherwise humanly impossible.

Obviously, faith does not give us magical powers by which we can literally command a tree to uproot itself and plant itself in the sea. This imagery is meant to tell us that faith will work miracles of faith, not necessarily physical miracles. In fact, if God ever did use us and our faith to work a physical miracle, it would only happen because it was a motivation for the far more important gift of the increase of faith.

What, then, can a little faith do? It can uproot sin from your heart and from the hearts of those around you. It can nourish you and others in ways that seem impossible. Just as a tree cannot normally be planted in the sea and survive, the gift of faith, even a little faith, will enable the soul to be nourished and strengthened in ways that otherwise seem impossible. A martyr perfectly illustrates this fact. Normally, persecution and death are not considered to be nourishing to a person. But when a person has faith and suffers martyrdom on account of Christ, then their soul will be fed by the persecution itself. And that is among the greatest of miracles possible. Suffering, persecution, illness, poverty, and every other difficulty imaginable are transformed by God into a source of nourishment when we endure them with true faith.

Reflect, today, upon the prayer of the apostles: “Increase our faith.” Some of the greatest mystics taught that faith darkens the intellect. By this darkening, they mean that, by faith, God will lead us into the unknown, on a path that He alone is aware of. We will become instruments of His transforming grace in ways that are completely beyond our natural abilities. Pray for an increase of faith. When our Lord hears your humble prayer, by which you also confess your lack of faith, He will increase that faith, uproot sin and evil, and plant your soul in places in which you become nourished in ways that you could have never imagined possible.

Most glorious Lord, Increase my faith. Give me a pure faith—a faith that enables You to lead me down the unknown path to Your glory. With this gift of faith, please use me to bring forth Your miraculous power by which sin is uprooted and souls are nourished by You alone. Jesus, I trust in You.