Some years
ago I was in the midst of a family crisis and begging God for patience and
guidance. The situation was out of my
control, and I was at wit’s end about how to respond to it. So I turned to my pastor during confession for
advice and got excellent advice that I’ve never forgotten.
“You’ll
never regret standing by your children,” he said. Then he told me that for my penance, every
time I felt overwhelmed I should pray the Prayer of St. Francis. This didn’t solve the problem per se, but it
helped me cope with it. It rescued me
from the depths of panic. Although it
took time to relieve my distress, I could feel God answering my prayers through
the wisdom of this insightful priest.
As I
meditated today on Psalm 34 – one of my favorites—it hit me how often God
responds to our prayers through the actions of other people, but we have to be
alert to such signals as coming from God or we may think that God hasn’t heard
us crying out.
It takes a
lot of faith to believe in the efficacy of prayer although I’m pretty sure
almost everyone—including agnostics and atheists—instinctively turns to it at
times of distress. We’ve all experienced
times when it seemed that our prayers weren’t answered. Someone we loved died too young from an
illness. We didn’t get the job we needed. One of our children was going through
a particularly hard time, etc.
But even at
such times, God often uses people as His instruments to help ease our pain or
help us find a new path. This is what
the communion of saints is all about. I
think of a period when I was coping with a major betrayal at work, and almost
miraculously every time I needed a different person to help, he or she
appeared. Coincidence? More like heaven-sent.
Of course, we
have to listen to the promptings of the spirit when it’s OUR turn to be an
instrument of God’s love and healing as the Prayer of St. Francis so
wonderfully reminds us. If you haven’t
prayed the prayer recently, do so in light of Psalm 34. It sheds so much light on what it truly means.
The Prayer
of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument
of your peace:
where there is hatred, let
me sow love;
where there is injury,
pardon;
where there is doubt,
faith;
where there is despair,
hope;
where there is darkness,
light;
where there is sadness,
joy.
O divine Master, grant
that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to
console,
to be understood as to
understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that
we receive,
it is in pardoning that we
are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
No comments:
Post a Comment