Daily Mass Gospel Reflection- Ordered by Prayer

Word on Fire Ministry ^ | 10.5.22 | Bishop Robert Barron

[MurphsLaw]

Friends, our Gospel for today gives us an opportunity to reflect on the great prayer that Jesus taught us.
Think how this prayer links us to all of the great figures in Christian history,
from Peter and Paul to Augustine, Thomas Aquinas,
Francis of Assisi, John Henry Newman, G.K. Chesterton, John Paul II,
and right up to the present day.

A desire to pray is planted deep within us.
This just means the desire to speak to God and to listen to him.
Keep in mind that prayer is not designed to change God’s mind
or to tell God something he doesn’t know.
God isn’t like a big city boss or a reluctant pasha whom we have to persuade.
He is rather the one who wants nothing other than to give us good things—
though they might not always be what we want.

Can you see how this prayer rightly orders us?
We must put God’s holy name first;
we must strive to do his will in all things and at all times;
we must be strengthened by spiritual food or we will fall;
we must be agents of forgiveness;
we must be able to withstand the dark powers.

[MurphsLaw]

+++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."+++

[fidelis]

One thing that’s beautiful about the Our Father is that it is a prayer that all Christians can pray together. There is a tiny minority of Christians that don’t believe Jesus meant for us to pray the prayer word for word (but rather as a kind of template) but that goes against what Jesus told his disciples when he said, “When you pray, say...”

[MurphsLaw]

For sure... they diminish what Jesus says as...
ambiguous. Not good, not good.

What I always wanted to know...
And it piques my interest having read Dr. Bergsma's awesome book
"Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls" which I think is a must read...
But in today's Gospel Jesus is asked to teach the Apostles
How to Pray - "Just as JOHN taught his disciples"
To which Jesus should have said
"Oy vey... what am I ?
Chopped liver?"... bada bing!

But no seriously... this highlights how well regarded and important John the Baptist must have been... aside from the Herod kerfuffle.
And if he did spend some time with the Essenes...
and Christ somehow knew "how" John taught his disciples how to pray...
Then is there a deeper connection than scripture has revealed between Jesus and john - and the Essene community??
Yes, John's disciples would ultimately then follow Christ
but I wonder why the Gospel has John as the go-to for Christ to be asked to emulate John- unworthy to even loosen the sandals of the Lord- for the Prayer that is so central to Christian worship.

think about stuff like this now and again...

[fidelis]

Yes, John's disciples would ultimately then follow Christ but I wonder why the Gospel has John as the go-to for Christ to be asked to emulate John- unworthy to even loosen the sandals of the Lord- for the Prayer that is so central to Christian worship.

I think John is important for all the reasons you give, but to be precise it is the disciples that ask that Jesus teach them to pray like John taught his disciples, not the Gospel or the Gospel writer holding up John as the standard. The disciples at this point don't get the fact that that Jesus is something far, far, greater than John-- or anyone else. It seems they might have had a little bit of an inferiority complex because John was so highly regarded as a prophet by everyone.

[MurphsLaw]

I don't know the timing...
But I think John's baptism of Jesus is pretty early on too..
I think he was pretty clear that Jesus was numero uno- the One who they were waiting for
That he should decrease in visibility... (Herod took care of that)
just seems he had more prominence than scriptures bear out-
Similar to the lack of the Blessed Virgin activities in the Gosoels...
So the Gospel writer John - years later- starts his Gospel writing with account of John the Baptist... and then then into Jesus... highlighting the Baptist's importance again..
So back to Luke 11...
I wonder if the disciple who asks to teach how to pray like John t he Baptist... could be the Apostle John...
And that maybe he was a disciple of the Baptist-
and possibly familiar with Essene culture as well.

Bergsma has some interesting thoughts on this- nothing concrete-
It could all tie in though.. the Bread and Wine of the Sacrament,