This Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time and the Gospel reading is Luke 11:1-13, which is when Jesus teaches his disciples "The Our Father."
Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he had finished one of his disciples said to him, "Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples." He said to them, "When you pray, say: Father, hallowed by your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us, and do no subject us to the final test."Obviously the prayer that we pray today has slightly different wording and is longer, but the skeleton is still the same. There are seven petitions in the prayer and it is the same seven that we pray today. My point of this post is to help you see that "The Our Father" isn't just another prayer. All prayer is so important, but this prayer takes preeminence. There are many reasons why we hold "The Our Father" in such high esteem and if you would like to read about it and how to pray it please visit the Catechism starting on paragraph 2759.
"The Lord's Prayer 'is truly the summary of the whole gospel'" (CCC 2761). Wow, that is quite the statement and if we actually think about it, it does make sense. St. Augustine says that all the prayers in the rest of Scripture are summed up in the Lord's Prayer. It is Christ who gave us this prayer and in Christ all is fulfilled. Why then do we become so blah when we say it, whether it is at Mass or in other prayers? We stop praying and start reciting. Why?
