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Prayer, Parts of the Mass

Prayer as God’s gift

  • CCC 2559 "Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God." But when we pray, do we speak from the height of our pride and will, or "out of the depths" of a humble and contrite heart? He who humbles himself will be exalted;
    • Humility is the foundation of prayer. Only when we humbly acknowledge that "we do not know how to pray as we ought," are we ready to receive freely the gift of prayer. "Man is a beggar before God."
  • CCC 2560 "If you knew the gift of God!" The wonder of prayer is revealed beside the well where we come seeking water: there, Christ comes to meet every human being. It is he who first seeks us and asks us for a drink. Jesus thirsts; his asking arises from the depths of God's desire for us. Whether we realize it or not, prayer is the encounter of God's thirst with ours. God thirsts that we may thirst for him.
    • CCC 2561 Prayer is the response of faith to the free promise of salvation and also a response of love to the thirst of the only Son of God.

Prayer as covenant

  • CCC 2562 Where does prayer come from? Whether prayer is expressed in words or gestures, it is the whole man who prays. But in naming the source of prayer, Scripture speaks sometimes of the soul or the spirit, but most often of the heart (more than a thousand times). According to Scripture, it is the heart that prays. If our heart is far from God, the words of prayer are in vain.
  • CCC 2563The heart is the dwelling-place where I am, where I live; according to the Semitic or Biblical expression, the heart is the place "to which I withdraw."
    • The heart is our hidden center, beyond the grasp of our reason and of others; only the Spirit of God can fathom the human heart and know it fully. The heart is the place of decision, deeper than our psychic drives. It is the place of truth, where we choose life or death. It is the place of encounter, because as image of God we live in relation: it is the place of covenant.
      • Spirituality of the Rose Window
      • Fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom
  • CCC 2564 Christian prayer is a covenant relationship between God and man in Christ. It is the action of God and of man, springing forth from both the Holy Spirit and ourselves, wholly directed to the Father, in union with the human will of the Son of God made man.

Prayer as communion

  • CCC 2565 In the New Covenant, prayer is the living relationship of the children of God with their Father who is good beyond measure, with his Son Jesus Christ and with the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Kingdom is "the union of the entire holy and royal Trinity ... with the whole human spirit."
    • Thus, the life of prayer is the habit of being in the presence of the thrice-holy God and in communion with him. This communion of life is always possible because, through Baptism, we have already been united with Christ. Prayer is Christian insofar as it is communion with Christ and extends throughout the Church, which is his Body. Its dimensions are those of Christ's love.

Types of Prayers

  1. Blessing and Adoration
    • Being in the presence of God
    • Adoration is the first attitude of man acknowledging that he is a creature before his Creator. It exalts the greatness of the Lord who made us and the almighty power of the Savior who sets us free from evil.
  2. Prayer of Petition
    • The first movement of the prayer of petition is asking forgiveness, like the tax collector in the parable: "God, be merciful to me a sinner!"
    • Centered on the desire and search for the Kingdom to come → “Thy will be done”
  3. Prayer of Intercession
    • Praying on behalf of others → this is how Jesus prays. He prays to the Father on the behalf of all men, he is the one intercessor. “Through Christ our Lord”
  4. Prayer of Thanksgiving
    • Thanksgiving characterizes the prayer of the Church which, in celebrating the Eucharist, reveals and becomes more fully what she is.
    • Recognizes God’s place in our heart.
  5. Prayer of Praise
    • Thanksgiving characterizes the prayer of the Church which, in celebrating the Eucharist, reveals and becomes more fully what she is.
    • CCC 2643 The Eucharist contains and expresses all forms of prayer: it is "the pure offering" of the whole Body of Christ to the glory of God's name and, according to the traditions of East and West, it is the "sacrifice of praise."

The Way of Prayer

  • To the Father
    • CCC 2664 There is no other way of Christian prayer than Christ. Whether our prayer is communal or personal, vocal or interior, it has access to the Father only if we pray "in the name" of Jesus. The sacred humanity of Jesus is therefore the way by which the Holy Spirit teaches us to pray to God our Father.
  • To Jesus
    • The prayer of the Church, nourished by the Word of God and the celebration of the liturgy, teaches us to pray to the Lord Jesus.
    • But the one name that contains everything is the one that the Son of God received in his incarnation: JESUS. The divine name may not be spoken by human lips, but by assuming our humanity The Word of God hands it over to us and we can invoke it: "Jesus," "YHWH saves." The name "Jesus" contains all: God and man and the whole economy of creation and salvation. To pray "Jesus" is to invoke him and to call him within us.
  • “Come, Holy Spirit”
    • No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' except by the Holy Spirit." Every time we begin to pray to Jesus it is the Holy Spirit who draws us on the way of prayer by his prevenient grace.
    • He is the artisan of the living tradition of prayer. To be sure, there are as many paths of prayer as there are persons who pray, but it is the same Spirit acting in all and with all. It is in the communion of the Holy Spirit that Christian prayer is prayer in the Church.

Parts of the Mass

  • Introductory Rites
    • Greeting → begins “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”
    • Penitential Rite → Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy
    • Glory to God
  • Liturgy of the Word
    • Three readings and a psalm, Homily, Creed, Petitions
  • Liturgy of the Eucharist
    • Preparations of the Gifts, Eucharistic Prayer, Communion Rite
  • Concluding Rites
    • Dismissal, Living the Eucharist in the World