Sunday, July 27, is the 16th Sunday in Ordinary Time. Mass readings: Genesis 18:20-32; Psalm 138:1-2, 2-3, 6-7, 7-8; Colossians 2:12-14; Luke 11:1-13.

In this week’s Sunday Gospel, the Lord gives three prescriptions for prayer.

The Gospel opens in response to a request, “Lord, teach us to pray.” The Lord gives the Our Father. Luke’s version is substantially similar but a little different from Matthew’s.

There are five basic disciplines taught in the Our Father. 

Our Father who art in heaven ...

We are praying to our Father, who loves us, who provides for us, and who sent his only Son to die for us and save us. At the heart of our worship and prayer is a deep and personal experience of God’s love and fatherly care for us.

hallowed by thy name ...

Praise and love God; praise and thanksgiving make us people of hope and joy.

thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

A basic component and discipline of prayer and the spiritual life is receiving the word and instruction of God, so that his will might be manifest in our obedience.  

Give us today our daily bread ... 

Allow “bread” to be a symbol of all our needs. Take every opportunity to pray for others. 

and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. 

Sin is understood on two levels: our personal sins and the whole climate of sin, the structures of sin that reinforce and underlie our own sins (referred to here as “evil”).

We now go on to the next prescription.

Jesus goes on to speak of a persistent neighbor and of other images of persistence: asking and seeking. The teaching that we persist in prayer is something of a mystery. 

God is not forgetful. Yet he teaches in many places that we are to persevere, even pestering him, in our prayer. Perhaps he seeks to help us clarify what we really want. Maybe he wants to strengthen our faith. Perhaps he wants to instill in us appreciation for the finally answered prayer. Whatever it may be, the exact reason is a mystery. But persistent prayer is taught and insisted upon by Jesus, here and elsewhere.

Jesus then concludes:

“If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

The rhythm of the Lord’s analogy seems a bit odd here. If an earthly father knows how to “give good gifts” to his son, then we would expect Jesus to say that the Heavenly Father also knows how to give “good gifts” to those who ask. But Jesus does not say this. Rather, he says that the Father gives “the Holy Spirit.” Why is this? Because it is the highest gift and contains all others. 

To receive the Holy Spirit is to receive the love of God, the glory of God, the life of God, and the wisdom of God. It is to receive God himself, who comes to live in us as in a temple. And with this gift comes every other gift and consolation. 

Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well (Matthew 6:33).