Pray As Much As You Can

My dearest one,

PRAY AS MUCH AS YOU CAN...

I stayed in the chapel for my personal silence after a heavy day. I have a little booklet of prayer, which I always carry with me in my pocket. I really was struck at that moment because of the desire to read all the prayers, starting from the very basic ones like the Lord’s Prayer, Hail Mary, and Glory Be... down to Morning and evening Prayers, Prayers before and after Meals, before and after confession, before and after communion and many more.

I don’t know for what reason, I felt so ashamed inside me before the Lord because I have taken most of the prayers for granted, and in fact, many of them, I don’t memorize at all. Shame on me! I realized that the Church has beautiful formulas of prayers, but unfortunately, people don’t bother to put them by heart. Some prayers have become so ordinary and common, and as I have said, we recite them without meaning, so we take them for granted.

The power behind our prayers are there, concealed in each line, and I guess, we just have to sit down in silence and meditate on them. The sad part is that, we don’t allocate time and we don’t exert extra effort because we feel so convenient reciting them (just lip service), or just patting our prayer books. We need extra effort to understand our prayers.

Today, I feel really provoked spiritually in the guidelines for confession, the examination of conscience or the examination of consciousness, especially reflecting our prayers basing on the commandments of the Lord, on our relationship with people and with God, prayer life and behaviour. Though I do examination of my consciousness/ conscience most of the days, I still feel I am doing very little. For a priest like me, this lack of personal meditation and examination is a big challenge.

We have so much to confront in our silence, not just our sins but also our misgivings. We also have to see the graces unnoticed and our lack of appreciation for the many little blessings we received from God. Every single day is a miracle, and we take it for granted. We always fail to thank God because some of these blessings are invisible to human eyes, and we don’t have TIME to see them in silence.

I am a priest, but like any other people, there are times that I struggle in my prayer life, spiritual or community life. If Jesus who is Lord, prayed early in the morning or late in the evening in secluded places, how much more to me, who is nothing than His creature? How much more to you? This is an invitation for each one of us that prayer is a necessity. If Jesus the Lord prayed and gave thanks to the Father, it implies that these gestures are very important in our Christian lives.

As I have said, I feel so ashamed that I don’t pray that much. I pray to God that I may be able to pray harder. Pray for me too as I pray for you.

Lots of love,
Raul