Gospel according to Saint Luke 11:1-13:
Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.” He said to them, “When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us, and do not subject us to the final test.”
And he said to them, “Suppose one of you has a friend to whom he goes at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, for a friend of mine has arrived at my house from a journey and I have nothing to offer him,’ and he says in reply from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked and my children and I are already in bed. I cannot get up to give you anything.’ I tell you, if he does not get up to give the visitor the loaves because of their friendship, he will get up to give him whatever he needs because of his persistence.
“And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish? Or hand him a scorpion when he asks for an egg? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”
At the gates of prayer
Luis CASASUS President of the Idente Missionaries
Rome, July 27, 2025 | XVII Sunday in Ordinary Time
Gén 18: 20-32; Col 2: 12-14; Lk 11: 1-13
The traditional art of Japanese archery is known as Kyūdō (the way of the bow).
A young apprentice approaches a Kyūdō master and says: Master, I want to learn how to shoot accurately. Teach me the technique.
The master nods, but instead of talking about stances or targets, he hands him a bow an says: First, learn to hold it without tension. Then learn to breathe with it. Do not shoot yet.
Day after day, the young man practices without firing a single arrow. He just breathes, aligns himself, and listens to the silence. Finally, frustrated, he asks: When will I learn to shoot?
The master replies: When you stop wanting to hit the target. The shot is not yours. The bow shoots when you disappear.
What does this have to do with prayer?
Just as the Zen archer does not seek to control the shot, but rather to align himself with the present moment, the disciples saw that Jesus did not pray to “get” something, but to be with the Father right now. His prayer was not technical, it was surrender, emptiness of everything that concerned him and did not come from the Father. That is why they said to him: Teach us how to pray.
Prayer, like archery, does not seek to focus on words or results. It is about emptying oneself, being present, letting the Spirit “shoot” from within.
But, of course, those of us who have had the grace to know Christ know that we must place our trust in Him and in our Father, who always “shoots first.” Therefore, every line of the Our Father and every inward glance at our state of prayer is a step closer to intimacy: Give us this day our daily bread, a reminder that we must live intensely in His presence, manifested in a thousand ways, trusting in what God is giving us to be faithful to His will right now.
Perhaps the first lesson we can learn from today’s Gospel is the sincerity of the first disciples, who, despite having prayed all their lives, recognize that there must be something deeper in prayer, for that was what they perceived in the Master.
—ooOoo—
The First Reading illuminates the true effects of prayer: Abraham pleads insistently with Yahweh not to destroy the city of Sodom. He does so as the father of a family, which Jesus holds up as an example of persevering prayer. But human corruption makes it impossible for the plans of divine mercy to be carried out, for there were not even ten righteous people in the city, only Lot’s family. And even then, some of them doubted or disobeyed. Abraham’s prayer served to reaffirm his bond with Yahweh, who kept his promises and made him “the father of nations.”
In any case, let us not forget that our Founder always sets Christ himself as the model of a person who prays, and therefore reminds us that our prayer should be supplicating, concise, simple, above all listening, continuous, filial, affectionate, and that it should deepen our mission.
Although, as Jesus says, “we do not know how to pray” and perhaps we are clumsily and unconsciously asking for a scorpion instead of an egg, we cannot stop doing so, for in doing so we give God proof that we trust in Him and not in the world. If we place our supplication before the altar, little by little we will learn to distinguish and take advantage of the divine response. Our prayer does not “change” God or his intentions, but it opens the doors of our heart so that he may enter fully into our lives.
Christ holds up children as models for entering the kingdom of heaven. But children are also models for our prayer, because they seek and find a thousand ways to communicate with their mother, with or without words.
As we well know, communication between a child and its mother is usually extraordinarily effective due to a combination of biological, emotional, and social factors that are intertwined from birth, and even before.
From pregnancy onwards, babies recognize their mother’s voice and respond to it with greater attention. The bond that develops through physical contact, caresses, and eye contact allows for a very precise emotional attunement.
This “silent dialogue” includes gestures, facial expressions, tone of voice, and physical contact that convey more than words. A powerful example is crying, a child’s tears.
Before language appears, mother and child understand each other through looks, sounds, crying, smiles… and, of course, the mother interprets these signals intuitively.
During the early years, the child’s brain is highly malleable: interactions with the mother create key structures for language and empathy.
This not only improves the effectiveness of communication, but also strengthens social and emotional development, and the child feels that they can express themselves freely without judgment, which encourages increasingly open and authentic communication.
This creates a “safe space” that facilitates emotional expression and strengthens the mother-child bond. It is as if they speak a shared language that goes beyond the verbal: a kind of emotional and spiritual “telepathy” that strengthens both understanding and bonding.
In his conversation with Nicodemus (Jn 3:1-21), Jesus anticipated all these observations and recommended to that good Pharisee not to “become like children,” but to be born again, to be able to grasp all the love that comes from the Spirit, without being contaminated by so many messages and demands of life. This is the freedom of a child, truly open to everything and above all to those who love him.
Let us now look at the Father to whom we speak. Although the Bible refers to God mostly as Father, we also find maternal images that reveal God’s tender, protective, and compassionate love, very similar to that of a mother:
As one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you (Is 66:13).
Can a woman forget her nursing child…? Even if she forgets, I will not forget you (Is 49:15). God presents himself as more faithful and loving than even a mother.
Jesus himself says: How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings! (Mt 23:27) A clearly maternal image of protection and tenderness.
These metaphors do not change God’s identity, but they broaden our understanding of his nature: not limited by gender, but rich in paternal and maternal love.
We said that words are not the center of prayer, but they certainly help us in our approach to God and in turning our attention away from the cares of the world and everything that weighs us down.
It is not just a matter of repeating words, but of expressing with our voice what is in our heart. As Pope Francis said, vocal prayer is “the prayer of the simple” and should not be despised as mere repetition. The Psalms say it poetically and profoundly: Trust in him always, pour out your heart before him (Psalm 62:8). Whether aloud or silently, the important thing is that prayer be sincere and spring from the soul.
For those of us who do not give enough value to vocal prayer, especially the Our Father or the Trisagio, let us keep in mind the following observations about vocal prayer, however obvious they may seem:
* It orders the heart and mind, for when we pronounce sacred words, our mind becomes focused, calm, and consciously directed toward God.
* It links us to the spiritual tradition; in particular, the Lord’s Prayer unites Christians with centuries of Christian prayer and with the very teaching of Jesus.
* It sustains prayer when the soul is dry or distracted. In moments of fatigue or spiritual dryness, vocal prayer acts as a thread that keeps us united with the Divine Persons.
* It opens the door to other forms of prayer that may seem more profound. By beginning with vocal prayer, one can enter into a fully contemplative or listening attitude, for such prayer becomes the beginning of a dialogue.
What matters: the heart behind the words As the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches (nos. 2700-2704), vocal prayer is valuable when it comes from within, not when it is merely a repetition without attention. Jesus himself warned against “vain repetitions”, but not against repetition itself, but against praying without intention or commitment. When you pray, do not babble like the pagans (Mt 6:7).
In his commentary on the Psalms, St. Augustine says: Your desire itself is your prayer; if the desire is continuous, the prayer is continuous. It was not in vain that the Apostle said: Pray without ceasing. But do we kneel, prostrate ourselves, and raise our hands without interruption, and is that why he says: Pray without ceasing? If we say that we can only pray like this, I think it is impossible to pray without ceasing.
There is another interior and continuous prayer, which is desire. Even if you are doing something else, if you desire rest in God, you do not interrupt your prayer. If you do not want to stop praying, do not interrupt your desire.
May God grant that after each moment of prayer, those who see us may feel the desire to pray so that they too may be transformed. And may you and I, like the first disciples, never cease to ask, each day: Christ, teach us to pray.
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In the Sacred Hearts of Jesus, Mary and Joseph,
Luis CASASUS
President
