Being in prayer

‘When you wake up each day, turn your first thoughts to God’    Nicolas Barré

Prayer is essentially about being present to oneself, to God, to all creation.

Often, we don’t find time to be present to ourselves, as we are caught up with many things. We might even feel guilty to take time for ourselves. It is only when we waste time with ourselves that we are ‘free’. Each of us is an existence of God, a presence of Christ, a gift to the world. Bonhoeffer expresses it like this: ‘if you refuse to be with yourself alone you are rejecting Christ’s call to you’.

Each of us needs a ‘peace centre’, a place where we can be most ourselves. Wait, be patient with God. The Spirit can touch in many ways, through our mind, imagination, memory, affectivity.

Listen to Him call you by name, asking you: ‘Who do you say I am’? ‘What do you want me to do for you’?

Prayer at times can be difficult. To encourage us to persevere in it, ‘the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words’ (Romans 8:26)

We need to be rooted in prayer and our relationship with God as we go to meet our brother and sister each day in whom Christ is present.

            ‘The one who advances in prayer finds  joy in God... But one must apply oneself to persevere for a long time to have this experience’    Nicolas Barré