One of the tragedies in today's world is our inability to pray well. Today, men and women are getting too busy with the struggles of life that they forget to spend little time with God in prayer. Prayer, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us, is “the raising of our minds and our hearts to God.” By the above, it means for us to pray, we must set aside a few minutes daily to speak with God as we do with our friends and loved ones. Lack of communication destroys our human connections with one another. Likewise, when we stop praying we drift away from God who desires to be in communion with us always.
It seems that modern men and women have been losing their capacity for silence and sincere encounter with themselves and with God. Humans are occupying themselves with the mundane things of life. Thus, we give little or no attention to the things of the sacred. However, living in a world where people pay much attention to worldly achievements and less of spiritual matters leads to a situation where by prayer is considered less important.
Nevertheless, no matter our striving for material achievement we should never forget to be people of prayer. It is not possible to live the Christian life faithfully while we lack the spiritual energy. Sooner or later, such a Christian will experience spiritual burnout and fatigue that will affect every other area of human life.
As humans, we need to cultivate the practice of silence so that we can calm our inner struggles and outer challenges. Through our practice of silence, we can truly encounter God within ourselves and in those around us. It is through prayer that we come to hear God’s voice in our noisy world. We need to pray so as not to be discouraged in our effort to liberate ourselves as individuals and collectively from everything that prevents us from attaining our God given potentials.
Dear friends in Christ, in prayer we will be able to discern God’s will for us
. Therefore, let us go out this week to be men and women of prayer. For scripture says, “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing.” (1 Thess 5:16).