Ask a priest

Very recently, in the opening prayer for the Sunday Mass, we heard this strange sounding request: “Almighty ever-living God, who in the abundance of your kindness surpass the merits and desires of those who entreat you, pour out your mercy upon us to pardon what conscience dreads and to give what prayer does not dare to ask.”

As people of faith, we rightfully heed Jesus’ open invitation: “Ask and you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you.” And he promises the Father in heaven will “give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him” (Luke 6:9,13).

Our prayer should include adoration, praise and thanksgiving as well as intercession for special needs. Consider beginning your response to the friend with a review of the Lord’s Prayer. We open with a petition of praise, “Hallowed be thy name.” We seek God’s will, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Our prayerful intercessions then flow from Jesus’ words, “give us this day our daily bread.”

The friend is no doubt troubled by a seeming lack of response to a particular request, such as healing for the sick and injured, family crisis, economic hardships, and so on. We need to remember that our God’s kindness and mercy “surpass the merits and desires of those who entreat him.” 

So, is there anything we dare not ask? It seems to me no, only insofar as we might be asking my will to be done rather than thy will be done. In other words, we need to surrender our will for a particular outcome to the wisdom of our loving Creator. We humbly submit the awareness of our mortality, our limitations, and the pains that befall a sinful humanity. Like we pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses,” we need to be grateful for a conscience, the knowledge of right and wrong, so that we may indeed plea for pardon of sins.

It is not necessarily due to our sinfulness that God may have a different response to our prayerful request. Even the greatest of saints were troubled with the same question this friend presents. The Psalms frequently beg God to come to our assistance, when so often it seems as if God has failed to hear us. So, all of God’s believing people wrestle with this reality.  

We would then, in fact, benefit mightily from reciting the Psalms and offering our meditative Rosary and Divine Mercy chaplets for our stated intentions. We then join the communion of saints and the whole Church as we pray. God will then certainly pour out the Holy Spirit in whatever way we most need at that time. Rather than physical healing, God might better prepare that seriously ill person for entry into eternal life. Rather than relief of a hardship, God might better equip that person for the cross he or she is to bear. We cannot know nor judge whether God’s response was fit to the occasion.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church offers help in response to this question. It reminds us we must first remember God is the loving Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and not our instrument to be used. Paul reminds us that often “we do not know how to pray as we ought” (Rom. 8:26). We want to ask God what is good for us, trusting the loving Father will answer in the way that best serves our well-being. And, as the fourth century Christian monk Evagrius Ponticus said, “Do not be troubled if you do not immediately receive from God what you ask him; for he desires to do something even greater for you, while you cling to him in prayer” (CCC 2735-2737).

In summary, it is always good to pray for the very fact we grow closer to our God when we do so. God is hearing and responding, simply trust in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon ourselves and all those for whom we pray.