Homily for the Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A
Brothers and sisters:
Have no anxiety at all, but in everything,
by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,
make your requests known to God. whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is just, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious,
if there is any excellence
and if there is anything worthy of praise,
think about these things.Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.Finally, brothers and sisters,
Keep on doing what you have learned and received
and heard and seen in me.
Then the God of peace will be with you.-Philippians 4:6-9
October is known as the month of the holy rosary, on account of the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary which falls on the seventh. This year, we will dedicate the homilies for the four Sundays of October to the rosary. These reflections are leading up to some deeply significant events in the life of our nation and world, and I hope they will prepare us to experience, with the power of prayer and the mysteries of our holy faith, what is to come
Today’s lesson from the epistle of St. Paul to the Philippians offers in outline the whole spirituality of the rosary. He gives us the two most essential components of prayer, which the rosary contains perfectly.
First, we are exhorted to pray for things with confidence and tranquility: Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.
This is the most common and instinctive idea of prayer we have. The very word God means, in its earliest origins (in Sanskrit), “one whom we ask for something.” God and Our Lady encourage us to ask for what we need: “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it will be opened to you.” Most of the Our Father consists of petitions for the things material and spiritual of which we have most need. In the Hail Mary, we ask for what we need “now and in the hour of our death.” As a good Father, Jesus wants his children to speak to him of what they need; Our Lady loves to hear our requests.
Yet the value of these prayers of petition is not in the answer we receive but in the gracious relationship we have to Our Lord and Our Lady, in which we are confident to ask for what we perceive ourselves as needing.
The answer to our request may be “no,” but only in view of something better or more important or urgent. They know better than we do; just as human parents know not always to give their children, at least not just now, the exact thing they ask for.
The Apostle also says that sometimes we do not receive what we ask for because we do not ask rightly. We find the way to ask rightly in what Paul goes on the say in today’s lesson from Philippians: whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
Prayer may begin with asking for what we need, but its crown, and indeed its deepest substance, is the heart’s attention to God and the things of God. When we consider—even if only in the simplest way, such as looking at a picture or even just announcing the name of the mystery considered in one of our decades—we unite our heart to the true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, gracious, excellent, and praiseworthy things that make up the joys, sorrows, enlightenments, and glories of our faith. We become able to see the connection between these mysteries and our own personal mysteries.
This loving consideration of divine things gives our prayer of petition more perfect focus and confidence and wisdom. The life and struggles and triumph of the Savior and his Blessed Mother teach us to join them in hope, and so ultimately to overcome our limitations and faults and to live in their company, hoping for the greatest fulfillment of our prayers: the happiness of heaven. We pray for Jesus to “lead all souls to heaven.” That is what petition combined with meditation on the beautiful mysteries of our faith does for us.
No wonder then, that Our Lady has continually urged us to take up our rosary daily, and the Church has echoed her appeals as well.
In praying the rosary alone or with others, let’s not allow our idea of perfection to get in the way of what is always truly good enough. We can pray distractedly, without a new thought in our heads, we can pray swiftly or slowly, but if we persevere we will have prayed effectively. After all, there were even saints, such as Thérèse of Lisieux, who did not even like praying the rosary, but that did not cause them to give it up, but rather to keep it up. If we do, we will experience its power undoubtedly, and even begin to prefer it to other prayers.
And then the peace of God will fill our hearts as Paul promises us today. Nothing better than that, to be sure!