Dear
Fr. Joe: It's hard to talk to God every day, because He doesn't answer back.
Any suggestions?
Yes! Tenacity and Openness.
Tenacity because God will send us answers to our questions and a word of comfort or challenge when we need it.
Openness because God's answer will not come to us in the way we expect.
Instead of looking for the sky to part and the Lord to sit with you, look for a word from your parents, a passage in the Bible, a homily from your priest. God speaks to us in ways that we will understand if we look in the places He is speaking. God gave us the world around us and the people in it to speak to us. We need to change how we listen.
From the Catechism:
2725 Prayer is both a gift of grace and a determined response on our part. It always presupposes effort. The great figures of prayer of the Old Covenant before Christ, as well as the Mother of God, the saints, and he himself, all teach us this: prayer is a battle. Against whom? Against ourselves and against the wiles of the tempter who does all he can to turn man away from prayer, away from union with God. We pray as we live, because we live as we pray. If we do not want to act habitually according to the Spirit of Christ, neither can we pray habitually in his name. The "spiritual battle" of the Christian's new life is inseparable from the battle of prayer.
2736 Are we convinced that "we do not know how to pray as we ought"? Are we asking God for "what is good for us"? Our Father knows what we need before we ask him, but he awaits our petition because the dignity of his children lies in their freedom. We must pray, then, with his Spirit of freedom, to be able truly to know what he wants.
Enjoy another day in God's presence!
By Fr. Joe Krupp
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300 W. Ottawa
Lansing, MI 48933
or: JoeInBlack@priest.com
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