This petition emphasises the goodness of God which is beyond human understanding since He ‘causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good’. It also expresses the covenant between God and ourselves as believers, but includes a basic solidarity will all of humanity, especially those who suffer. This bread is our sustenance, both material and spiritual, and the petition, though not inviting those who seek God’s kingdom into a life of idleness, should relieve us from nagging worry and preoccupation.
This reciting of this petition when confronted with poverty and hunger should instil a sense of solidarity, and an exercise of solidarity with the poor. There is an intimate connection between the Our Father and the parables of the Last Judgement. (To be continued).
The Our Father: ‘Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven (CCC2822-2827)
God the Father desires all people to be saved, and He expresses His forbearance throughout our earthly life so that we might take up the commandment to ‘love one another, even as I have loved you’ (Jn 13:34). The Father’s plan of salvation has been made known through Jesus Christ, and through Christ the believer can benefit (Eph 1:9-11). The Father’s will finds its perfect expression in the human will of Jesus, which is made explicit in the Garden of Gethsemane: ‘not my will, but yours, be done’.
Jesus learnt the human cost of obedience through freely taking up the path of suffering, and every believer must complete the same journey. In our cases this journey remains impossible without the assistance of the Holy Spirit. Only then can we surrender our will and choose what Christ always freely chose. The discovery of God’s will is never easy, and those who claim an immediate apprehension of God’s will must be treated with caution. The process of discernment requires perseverance, and prayerful reflection on the deepest desires of the heart. Should these bring peace to the heart, then this is a sign of their truthfulness. In the words of Dante, ‘In his will is our peace’.
Receiving Christ into our hearts begins the process of building a truly free human life
Every child dreads the day that they start sounding like their mother and father, or indeed start to look like them. The motives may be obscure, whether it is embarrassment at that age of life, or is perhaps the growing sense of inevitability in such matters. However, a more profound reflection on the relationship between personal freedom and the weight of biological and moral formation is possible. To start to sound like your parents, often means adopting their moral standpoints, long after having rebelled against their conformist ways. This phase of rejection does not last forever and, in later life, most people can feel nothing but gratitude for the way they were brought up, and the full extent of what was passed on in love now becomes the context for the exercise of freedom rather than its curtailment.
The same is true for religion. The way of faith allows for the exercise of freedom, starting from the ability to say yes. The Virgin Mary demonstrates a perfect example of the consequences of saying yes to the Archangel Gabriel. Her first thoughts were to visit her cousin, Elizabeth, in her hour of need, and to share the Good News of her own miraculous pregnancy. The Virgin Mary was caught up in the dynamism of the Incarnation, and she embarked on the long journey under the inspiration of her Son. Her tender ministry of accompaniment initially as a mother during those early years of childhood, and then throughout His public life and forwards into the life of the Church, became possible only through the freedom of saying Yes to the angel. The journey to Elizabeth’s house and the hardships that this must have entailed, mirror the later journeys of her Son, who in turn will bring the Good News in his person to those suffering and to those on the fringes of life.
The same anticipation of Jesus’ mission may be seen in the conduct of St Joseph, the just man who, diligent in respect to the Law of Moses, does not act without compassion. His decision to divorce Mary, having discovered that she is with child, fulfils the dictates of the Law of Deuteronomy, but his method of informality, thus most likely rejecting a public court case, shows his innate compassion to her plight. This sensitivity allows him to accept the angel’s message that Mary has conceived through the Holy Spirit. The taking of Mary and the unborn child into his house, legitimises the child, and fulfils the prophecies that the Saviour would be of the House of David. The profound care for the Law, combined with a sensitive disposition to the plight of humanity, will be seen in the mission of his adopted Son, who fulfils the Law’s demands while at the same time saying that not one iota of its precepts has been cancelled.
Just as the realisation that one’s moral and cultural formation has been achieved through one’s parents rather than in spite of them, so in matters of faith, to receive Christ into our hearts, is the beginning of the ability to build a truly free human life.
