Category: Prayers

“This is how you are to pray.” –Matthew 6:9 Mass Readings: February 20 First: Isaiah 55:10-11; Resp: Psalm 34:4-7,16-19; Gospel: Matthew 6:7-15 Listen to the Mass Readings Prayer is to communicate with the infinite, perfect, all-holy God, Who is Love (1 Jn 4:16). Therefore, prayer is one of the most important aspects of being a human being. Prayer is an awesome privilege and power. In prayer, we are necessarily “in way over our heads.” Because of this, “we do not know how to pray as we ought” (Rm 8:26). Thankfully, the Holy Spirit “helps us in our weakness” (Rm 8:26)....

“Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You?” –Matthew 25:37 When Jesus comes in glory on Judgment Day, He will judge us on whether we fed Him by feeding the least of His and our brothers and sisters (Mt 25:35, 42). Jesus is so concerned with feeding us that, when Peter told Jesus that he loved Him, Jesus said: “Feed My lambs” and “Feed My sheep” (Jn 21:15, 17). To feed us, Jesus even went to the unimaginable extreme of making Himself the Bread of Life (Jn 6:35) and feeding us with His own body and blood (Jn...

“Jesus said to them: ‘How can wedding guests go in mourning so long as the groom is with them? When the day comes that the groom is taken away, then they will fast.’ ” –Matthew 9:15 Mass Readings: February 16 First: Isaiah 58:1-9; Resp: Psalm 51:3-6,18-19; Gospel: Matthew 9:14-15 Listen to the Mass Readings In accord with Jewish tradition, Jesus associated fasting with mourning. Not in accord with any tradition, Jesus taught that His kind of fasting was to be preceded by a wedding banquet. In some cultures, people fast before a wedding and a wedding banquet, but I don’t...