Prayer is the lifting up of the mind and heart to God. Prayer is a dialogue. It is a meeting of personalities. The practice of prayer is a virtue and is the principle means by which we obtain God’s grace. Grace gives light to our intellect to know God’s will and it gives strength to our will to do it. It is grace that makes the humanly impossible possible. “…in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want. I can do all things in him who strengthens me”. (Philippians 4:12-13)
To what end do we pray? There are four ends to prayer. These are Adoration, Thanksgiving, Reparation and Supplication. We express our love and Adoration to God, because He is all good and loving. We give Thanks to God, because He gives us everything we have and cannot be outdone in generosity. We ask His mercy and forgiveness and offer Reparation for our sins, because we are sinners in need of His mercy. We ask Him for what we need and what we want, provided it is compatible with God’s will and for the good of our Immortal Soul.
Servant of God, Fr. John Hardon wrote “It is as if The Blessed Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, from all eternity, had been in conversation with each other. Now, God has invited us into this conversation”. In scripture we read “what is man that you [God] are mindful of him” (Psalms 8:4). It is not a small thing, God’s mind is always on us. In His infinite love, he desires the highest good for us, union with Him. God owes us nothing, yet He offers us everything. He offers us the eternal life and happiness His salvation brings, for which His Son endured death on the cross. Our principal response to God is in prayer. Prayer is the key that opens the portal to God’s grace into our earthly life, and it is God’s grace, that opens the portal to the eternal life of Heaven.