Question:
If we are not to petition during the
Prayer of the Heart (PH) and Lectio Divina (LD),
when and how should intercessory prayer happen/take
place?
Answer:
As an allocated moment (time and
space), intercessory prayer should happen at
a
special
time, as a specific type of prayer. During Mass we have a time for
it,
as we do during
the Divine Office (I am sure that in our personal prayer as well we do pray for others).
Your
may ask the same question for other types of prayer as well: Prayer
of Praise
and Prayer
of Thanksgiving,
"when shall we say
them?".
Here
I
would like to explain more
clearly
the deep relationship between LD & PH on the
one hand and Intercessory Prayer on the other.
It
is important to remember that LD is a key unavoidable type of prayer
today. It is by
far
the most transformative type of prayer. Why? Because it allows a part
of Christ (today's part of Christ-Word Bread) to become incarnated in
us and transform us in Him. The more we are transformed in Christ the
more powerful
our intercession becomes (acts on God). Jesus explains the
relationship between Lectio Divina and the efficiency of our prayer
(which
has
been answered) in the Gospel of St John where He
says: if you do my Will (keep my commandments) ask me all what you
want (because you'll BE in my Name) and you will receive it, i.e. the
Father will grant it to you (see John 15:7).
If
LD is done properly, all its transformative power will be enacted.
Then PH becomes much more fruitful and even more transformative.
Otherwise, if you practise PH without LD, its transformative power is
dramatically
decreased.
Now
let us consider what happens during the PH. While we are
practising
the PH, the Power of the Holy Spirit is
working
in our depths and through us will help Lift
the entire World to God
the Father in the Son, through the Holy Spirit. This is done
automatically. The more we are transformed in Jesus, the better it
works -
automatically.
St Therese explains that wonderfully at
the end of her Manuscript C, in the Story
of the Soul.
She says:
"All the saints have understood
this, and more especially those who filled the world with the light
of the Gospel teachings. Was it not in prayer that St. Paul, St.
Augustine, St. John of the Cross, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis,
St. Dominic, and so many other famous Friends of God have drawn
out this divine science which delights the greatest geniuses? A
scholar has said: “Give me a lever and a fulcrum and I will lift
the world.” What Archimedes was not able to obtain, for his request
was not directed by God and was only made from a material viewpoint,
the saints have obtained in all its fullness. The Almighty has given
them as fulcrum: HIMSELF ALONE; as lever: PRAYER which burns with a
fire of love. And it is in this way that they have lifted the world;
it is in this way that the saints still militant lift it, and that, until the end of time, the saints to come will lift it."
Intercessory
prayer has different levels of power and action. What is more
powerful than
to pray for somebody or - if it was given to you
by the grace of God
- to take this person and lift him/her to God and introduce him/her
into God's Fire of Love? Here St Therese presents to us the
most powerful version of Intercessory Prayer.
It
is a duty of love for us to pray for everybody. St Paul says that we
have to pray for one another all the time, without excluding any
other person. St James in the end of his Letter, mentioning the
Prophet Elijah speaks about the power of a prayer that is
heard/answered by God. This should grab
our attention and invite us to deepen our understanding of
Intercessory Prayer.
In
addition,
one has to remember the relationship between Intercessory Prayer and
the Priesthood of the Faithful. A Priest "prays for"
others, like St Paul invites us to do all the time. (This is why we
have the Divine Office. But it is something that becomes second
nature to us, it is part of the "fabric" of the New
Creature that we become in Christ. Being "in Christ" makes
the Fire of the Holy Spirit that dwells in Him, pray in us and
through us. The Holy Spirit knows how to pray and knows
what we should ask for, and the way God wants it. What depends on us
is not to pay attention to all that multiplicity of things to pray
for. Our duty is just to get closer and closer to Jesus and to the
Fire of His Love and be transformed by IT.
St Therese developed those important questions in two different places in that same Manuscript C, in the Story of the Soul:
"Since I have two brothers and my
little Sisters, the novices, if I wanted to ask for each soul what
each one needed and go into detail about it, the days would not be
long enough and I fear I would forget something important. For simple
souls there must be no complicated ways; as I am of their number, one
morning during my thanksgiving, Jesus gave me a simple means of
accomplishing my mission.
He made me [34r°] understand these
words of the Canticle of Canticles: “DRAW ME, WE SHALL RUN after
you in the odour of your ointments.” O Jesus, it is not even
necessary to say: “When drawing me, draw the souls whom I love!”
This simple statement: “Draw me” suffices; I understand, Lord,
that when a soul allows herself to be captivated by the odour of your
ointments, she cannot run alone, all the souls whom she loves follow
in her train; this is done without constraint, without effort, it is
a natural consequence of her attraction for You. Just as a torrent,
throwing itself with impetuosity into the ocean, drags after it
everything it encounters in its passage, in the same way, O Jesus,
the soul who plunges into the shoreless ocean of Your Love, draws
with her all the treasures she possesses. Lord, You know it, I have
no other treasures than the souls it has pleased You to unite to
mine; it is You who entrusted these treasures to me, and so I dare to
borrow the words You addressed to the heavenly Father, the last night
which saw You on our earth as a traveler and a mortal. Jesus, I do
not know when my exile will be ended; more than one night will still
see me singing Your Mercies in this exile, but for me will finally
come the last night, and then I want to be able to say to You, O my
God:“I have glorified you on earth; I have finished the work you
gave me to do. And now do you, Father, glorify me with yourself, with
the glory I had with you before the world existed.“I have
manifested your name to those whom you have given me out of the
world. They were yours, and you have given them to me, and they have
kept your word. Now they have learned that whatever you have given me
is from you; because the words you have given me, I have given to
them. And they have received them, and have known of a truth that I
came from you, and they have believed that you sent me.“I pray for
them, not for the world do I pray, but for those whom you have given
me, because they are yours; and all things that are mine are yours,
and yours are mine; and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in
the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep in your name
those whom you have given to me.
“But now I am coming to you; and
these things I speak in the world, in order that they may have joy
made full in themselves. I have given them your word; and the world
has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not
of the world. I do not pray that you take them out of the world, but
that you keep them from evil. They are not of the world, even as I am
not of the world.
“Yet not for these only do I pray,
but for those who through their word are to believe in me.
“Father, I will that where I am,
these also whom you have given me may be with me, that they may see
my glory which you have given me, because you loved me from the
foundation of the world. And I have made known your name to them, and
will make it known, that the love with which you loved me may be in
them, and I in them.”" (Manuscript C)
In
fact Thérèse is explaining the Common Priesthood of the Faithful,
received in Baptism, in Jesus-Priest. And a
few pages afterwards
she gives a further explanation of her new way of praying, her new
way of practising
the Prayer of the Heart:
“Mother, I think it is necessary to
give a few more explanations on the passage in the Canticle of
Canticles: “Draw me, we shall run,” for what I wanted to say
appears to me little understood. “No man can come after me, unless
the FATHER who sent me draw him,” Jesus has said. Again, through
beautiful parables, and often even without using this means so well
known to the people, He teaches us that it is enough to knock and it
will be opened, to seek in order to find, and to hold out one’s
hand humbly to receive what is asked for. He also says that
everything we ask the Father in His name, He will grant it. No doubt,
it is because of this teaching that the Holy Spirit, before Jesus’
birth, dictated this prophetic prayer: “Draw me, we shall run.”
What is it then to ask to be “Drawn”
if not to be united in an intimate way to the object which captivates
our heart? If fire and iron had the use of reason, and if the latter
said to the other: “Draw me,” would it not prove that it desires
to be identified with the fire in such a way that the fire penetrate
[36r°] and drink it up with its burning substance and seem to become
one with it? Dear Mother, this is my prayer. I ask Jesus to draw me
into the flames of His love, to unite me so closely to Him that He
live and act in me. I feel that the more the fire of love burns
within my heart, the more I shall say: “Draw me,” the more also
the souls who will approach me (poor little piece of iron, useless if
I withdraw from the divine furnace), the more these souls will run
swiftly in the odor of the ointments of their Beloved, for a soul
that is burning with love cannot remain inactive. No doubt, she will
remain at Jesus’ feet as did Mary Magdalene, and she will listen to
His sweet and burning words. Appearing to do nothing, she will give
much more than Martha who torments herself with many things and wants
her sister to imitate her. " (Manuscript C)
All
that
Thérèse is describing happens in the same movement of the Prayer of
the Heart.
Jesus attaches people to us (without us doing it or knowing it), so
when we do the PH we perform,
as well,
our Priestly duty of intercession. In the Prayer of the Heart
we offer our being to Jesus and are immersed in Him. The more we are
transformed in Jesus the more we are like a sponge, unknowingly
absorbing all the persons Jesus wants us to carry. They are like our
mystical body ("Union with Jesus" is union with a portion
of his Body). So whenever we do the Prayer of the Heart
(The more we are transformed in Jesus, the more PH becomes more
and more constant in us), and we are then immersed (with them) in His
Fire. The Power of the Holy Spirit in us is lifting not only us but
all our mystical body.
[Many
more things occur during the PH, and
this is just to reply to your question and show the
deeper
levels of Intercession and
their relationship with our level/degree of transformation in Jesus
and with the practice of the PH.]
In
conclusion we can say that it is not really possible to separate deep
powerful intercession from our being, from our PH.
When somebody asks us to pray for him/her, or we just remember to pray for a certain person/intention, let us not forget that (in my eyes) the most powerful, perfect and pure way to do it is to entrust this intention to Our Lady, by saying one "Hail Mary" and that's it. If your remember again this person/intention, you may just redo that again: say the "Hail Mary", entrusting this person to Mary. St Therese used to say that Our Lady knows better the will of God (what to say to God and how to say it), we don't. In this sense she is called "Throne of Wisdom", because the Wisdom of God, Jesus, is dwelling in her in His absolute perfection while it is not the case for us. We either carry too much the person, or worry too much, or are busy too much in dealing and arranging the life of others, forgetting our utter ignorance. And all this is not intercessory prayer, but impurity added to our way of dealing with God.
When somebody asks us to pray for him/her, or we just remember to pray for a certain person/intention, let us not forget that (in my eyes) the most powerful, perfect and pure way to do it is to entrust this intention to Our Lady, by saying one "Hail Mary" and that's it. If your remember again this person/intention, you may just redo that again: say the "Hail Mary", entrusting this person to Mary. St Therese used to say that Our Lady knows better the will of God (what to say to God and how to say it), we don't. In this sense she is called "Throne of Wisdom", because the Wisdom of God, Jesus, is dwelling in her in His absolute perfection while it is not the case for us. We either carry too much the person, or worry too much, or are busy too much in dealing and arranging the life of others, forgetting our utter ignorance. And all this is not intercessory prayer, but impurity added to our way of dealing with God.
I
hope this
helps.
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