Deacon's Homily, Thursday 27th week Year 1

Yesterday, we heard how the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray. Jesus answers by teaching them the prayer that will become the most frequently used of all Christian prayers, the Our Father. Jesus teaches them how to pray, but he doesn't stop there. He knows just all too well that if his disciples pose the question of how, it will sooner or later be followed by the question of why. It is this why that today's reading is concerned with.

Jesus assures us that God the Father will be there for us as a father is there for his child. He is even mocking the disciples gently, giving them absurd examples to show how the Father would never act: If his son asks for a fish, will he then instead of a fish give him a serpent? No, the Father is there, listening and acting, providing us with what we need.

But even if Jesus asserts that the Father always listens to anyone who prays to him, some of us may have experienced moments of doubt. There might have been times when we have begged God for help, without getting an answer. At least not the answer we hoped for. And we feel from within ourselves this troubling question: Why?

This why may contain resignation and despair, a why without any visible chance of solution. But this is also a question that God wants to hear from us. Children pose this question all the time. Why is it like this or that? And we answer: Because so and so. Yes, but WHY? And in the end, it might be the child who makes us wonder why.

This fundamental question is rooted in the core of our very existence. God created us in his image, we are made for relationship, we are made for divine interaction! We are called to turn to our Creator in a constant dialogue, or to say it with John Henry Newman as he quotes St Augustine: Cor ad Cor Loquitor - heart speaks to heart. To enable this open-hearted relationship, God gives us the Holy Spirit. This is the ultimate gift that our Father wants to offer us. This is the gift that can lead us to an answer for all our why's.

In a moment, we will pray the prayer that Jesus taught us. Let us then silently open our hearts to the mystery we celebrate, as we ask our father: Thy will be done.