Posted on 08/25/2016 7:14:46 AM PDT by Salvation
The Lord says that we have to pray and indicates that without prayer we will give way to temptation. Thus prayer is essential for us to escape sin and keep our lives on the right path. While God offers many graces to overcome sin and live holy lives, those graces are often delivered through the doorway of prayer. Prayer is God’s way of knocking at the door of our heart; prayer is our way of answering. Prayer is God’s offer and prayer is our response. Jesus says,
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me (Rev 3:20).
The shared meal referred to here, beyond its reference to the Eucharist, is also a sign of intimacy. While our culture is casual about eating (and just about everything else), in those days sharing a meal was not done with just anyone. Meals were shared with close family and friends. That is one reason that people of Jesus’ time were often surprised to see the people with whom Jesus shared meals. St. Peter also shocked the people of his time when he entered the household of a Gentile (Cornelius) and ate with him (Acts 10 & 11).
So, Jesus knocking at the door of our heart, seeking entrance, and sharing a meal, is a sign of reverence and intimacy. And we surely also need the food He offers: His Word and His Word made flesh.
Yes, prayer is both beautiful and essential.
Yet many Christians find prayer difficult. To some degree, our difficulties today are greater than in previous eras due to the constant noise and abundant distractions of our time. So noisy and frantic are our lives that sitting still and being silent is downright unnerving for many.
This is all the more reason that we must pray and pray well!
Learning to pray is not just a “fake it till you make it” proposition. As with any other area of life, we need to be taught; we can benefit from the experience of those who have gone before us. While it is true that prayer must be more than a “technique,” it is also true that prayer is more than a vague and purely subjective experience. Thus teaching can help us to find what is best and to avoid pitfalls that can discourage us.
Of all the books on prayer I recommend, The Fulfillment of All Desire by Dr. Ralph Martin is at the very top of my list. Anyone for whom I have been a spiritual director will attest that my first request of him or her is to obtain a copy of Dr. Martin’s book and begin reading it.
The book is valuable not only due to Ralph’s own wonderful insights, but also because he organizes and summarizes the teachings of the great Doctors of prayer (from the Catholic and Western traditions) so well. He draws heavily from St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Francis De Sales, St. Therese of Lisieux, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, and St. Thomas Aquinas.
He organizes the material along the fundamental stages of prayer: the purgative way, the illuminative way, and the unitive way. In the purgative stage we seek, by God’s grace, to identify our sins and attachments and to become increasingly free of them. We undergo basic conversion and begin to develop the habit of prayer. In the illuminative stage we see our love for and intimacy with God and neighbor increase, the virtues grow stronger within us, and our prayer become quieter and deeper. In the unitive stage, having made progress by grace, we receive a habitual, deep, and ever-deepening union with God, marked by joy, humility, and stability.
In his presentation of each stage, Dr. Martin samples richly from the writings of the saints and the teaching of the Church. He also gives much practical advice that helps to root the teaching within the setting of the modern world. He goes to the sources and brings them to us, applying their wisdom to our situation.
Simply put, the book is essential to anyone who seeks a guide to prayer.
And, dear readers, I hope you do seek a guide to prayer, for prayer is essential. Jesus said that temptation is looming, and if we don’t pray our lives can go off track pretty quickly without that remedy. But the Lord did not leave us alone to respond to so great a summons! He has sent us saints and biblical wisdom to teach us. And in our times, He anointed Dr. Ralph Martin to compile and present this wisdom to us freshly and comprehensively.
If you don’t have a copy of The Fulfillment of All Desire, go sell all that you have and buy one! 🙂
And her husband of barely a year will also start at Genesis and slowly piece together how to be a husband.
But who will tell them to change the baby's diapers? What will happen to the child while the parents are reading the all-sufficient and perspicuous Bible to learn their duties? No other source, you propose, is needed.
The husband has skipped ahead and now prays only in his closet. Regrettably he's allergic to moth balls, but, hey, the clear and complete Bible... or the part he's read so far ... told him to do that.
And no Christian would presume to advise him. So the baby has diaper rash, the laundry isn't done, the whole family has diet and nutrition issues. But it's all good because they're reading their Bible.
She's reading the Watchtower New World translation, and he's reading the NRSV. But there's nothing in the Scriptures about translations, and the Scriptures have it all — even when praying in your closet gives you respiratory distress. The Bible says closet, so closet it is.
And her husband of barely a year will also start at Genesis and slowly piece together how to be a husband.
But who will tell them to change the baby's diapers? What will happen to the child while the parents are reading the all-sufficient and perspicuous Bible to learn their duties? No other source, you propose, is needed.
The husband has skipped ahead and now prays only in his closet. Regrettably he's allergic to moth balls, but, hey, the clear and complete Bible... or the part he's read so far ... told him to do that.
And no Christian would presume to advise him. So the baby has diaper rash, the laundry isn't done, the whole family has diet and nutrition issues. But it's all good because they're reading their Bible.
She's reading the Watchtower New World translation, and he's reading the NRSV. But there's nothing in the Scriptures about translations, and the Scriptures have it all — even when praying in your closet gives you respiratory distress. The Bible says closet, so closet it is.
I bought the book on kindle today and it is awesome. Thank you for posting this.
“anf Mark ?”
And? Do you mean Matthew?
Are you suggesting Luke wasn’t inspired because Matthew has a longer version?
Your use of Yehova prompted two lines of thought.
(We’ve been tangling so long that I hope you understand that I’m weary of tangling for its own sake.)
So, first, I suggest it’s a choice not made solely on the basis of internal evidence to present the Name as Yehova. There are impressive, though not conclusive, reasons to support a different construction of the Tetragrammaton, where the Heh implies a vowel and the Vav is something like a ‘W’.
I’m not here to argue one or the other. I just want to note that either construction depends on information outside of the TaNaKh itself.
Second, we. I just suggest that we need “Origin Stories” for the Scriptures and their authority. We have, as you know, not only the text but the process of determining which texts are authoritative and which are not.
And then there’s the problem of textual variants. It’s not enough, I think, to say that the Textus Receptus is authoritative. Such a statement leads to wondering, “Sez who?” How and why should the Christian think that these people have the authority and grace to select books and textual variants?
Im not asking for a defense of your answer. I AM asking for an account of what your answer is. How do people of your opinion decide that these books and these variants are the real deal and those are not.
I recognize that that’s a hug3 digression from the topic at issue. But someday I would be grateful for an answer.
.
The vowel pointings in the Aleppo and the St Petersburg codices show beyond a shadow of doubt that the name is Yehova.
There is no “w” sound in Hebrew names.
What other authority can there even be?
.
Just en passant, The way you teach people to make a ‘w’ sound is to have them make an ‘oo’ sound. If the vav stands for an ‘oo’ you have at lease the beginning of a ‘w’.
There’s an alternate exppanation for the vowel pointing.
If you write the Tetragrammaton and point it for adonai but with the changes the suit the Tetragrammaton, then you get Ye Ho Va pointing.
Im not a4guing either way. I’m reporting.
Also there is at least one source in Greek reporting an “iaoue” sort of thing. FWIW.
.
No part of the word of Yehova was presented originally in Greek.
Paul assured us of this in his epistle to the Romans.
The oracles of Yehova are committed to Judah.
The Greek translations stumble like a drunk on a stairway with the Hebrew traditions and culture.
They call the appointed times “feasts of the Jews” but no Hebrew would ever have made such a gross error.
.
.
Yod Hay Vav Hey doesn’t come close to spelling “adonai.”
.
This is an account of the idea I was referring to.
You do not need a book to teach you how to talk to your father. But do you know how to listen to him?
too often people listen and think they know God.
but they lack discernment.
So books are helpful in teaching us what the father teaches. So are the sermons we hear in church.
The book seems fairly good, but is one to read a bit at a time and think about and pray over.
Words MEAN something
“The End of Desire” is almost a play on words to Catholic thinkers. There is the obvious meaning with its implications. Desire ceases when it is satisfied. Only God can fully satisfy every desire.
Also, “end” can mean purpose or “that for the sake of which.” We, or some of us, find a kind of longing in us which is only strengthened by creaturely satisfactions. This desire drives us to look beyond the world. God himself is what that desire is aimed at. He is its purpose.
Yes, words mean things. Only God is “The Fulfillment of All Desire.” Most Catholic thinkers understand themselves as participants in a very long conversation. Conversations develop their own “jargon” and common phrases. Many, possibly most, Catholics will see the title and understand that it's about life with God. And of course one might note the subtitle — if one were going to look at the book before criticizing it, an unusual procedure these days.
It's distressing to note how this thread developed. One person implies that Msgr Pope is saying we need this book. What he actually says is we need prayer. Another person scoffs that we don't need priests — though it's clear that, since the Post mentions three women, there's no suggestion that only priests can help with prayer.
There's a contention that all we need is the Bible. But, again, nobody said this book was needed. Words mean things; helpful and necessary are not synonyms. I find this book helpful. (I'm currently rocking an autographed copy ... ain't I special!) And Dr. Martin — not a priest, by the way — is a good guy, and I like to talk with good guys about important things, don't you? So I like to read what Dr. Martin and the people to whom he refers have to say about the important matter of our personal relationship with God. Why wouldn't, why shouldn't I?
My experience as a counsellor leads me to believe that a great many people aren’t clear about what is on their hearts and that conversation helps clarify things.
D00d!
Anybody who thinks Catholics all think alike should watch when, say, Benedictines, Dominicans, Franciscans, amd Jesuits get together.
(Mostly we tease each other.)
meh
Prayers to God are only of two types....thanksgiving and supplication. Truth is most prayers written in books do not do anything other than give a person something to say without thinking.
Two prayers are sufficient....Thank you.and Direct my path
We can talk
That’s why the doors to the throne of Grace are wide open to a Christian.
Precisely
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.