Lord, teach us to pray
God is a saving God. He calls all people to salvation in Jesus Christ, and he does not discriminate or segregate. His kingdom is open to all people, all races, all cultures, all languages, and all walks of life. And those who are most in need are given preference. For he is the Father of all and cares for those for whom people do not care. Do we do enough to bring his Son to all? Do we open the Christian community to all, without any discrimination? Or is there a bit of Jonah alive in us?
The disciples must have admired Jesus when he prayed, for when he had finished, they asked him to teach them to pray. This is indeed what we too should ask him in this Eucharist, that our prayer may be wide and deep like his, giving honor to the Father and bringing to him the stream of the needs and concerns of all. And like him in our prayers, we try not to bend God’s will to ours, but ours to God’s will and intentions.
Reading: Jonah 4:1-11
Jonah was furious. He lost his temper. He yelled at God, “God! I knew it—when I was back home, I knew this was going to happen! That’s why I ran off to Tarshish! I knew you were sheer grace and mercy, not easily angered, rich in love, and ready at the drop of a hat to turn your plans of punishment into a program of forgiveness!
“So, God, if you won’t kill them, kill me! I’m better off dead!”
God said, “What do you have to be angry about?”
But Jonah just left. He went out of the city to the east and sat down in a sulk. He put together a makeshift shelter of leafy branches and sat there in the shade to see what would happen to the city.
God arranged for a broad-leafed tree to spring up. It grew over Jonah to cool him off and get him out of his angry sulk. Jonah was pleased and enjoyed the shade. Life was looking up.
But then God sent a worm. By dawn of the next day, the worm had bored into the shade tree and it withered away. The sun came up and God sent a hot, blistering wind from the east. The sun beat down on Jonah’s head and he started to faint. He prayed to die: “I’m better off dead!”
Then God said to Jonah, “What right do you have to get angry about this shade tree?”
Jonah said, “Plenty of right. It’s made me angry enough to die!”
God said, “What’s this? How is it that you can change your feelings from pleasure to anger overnight about a mere shade tree that you did nothing to get? You neither planted nor watered it. It grew up one night and died the next night. So, why can’t I likewise change what I feel about Nineveh from anger to pleasure, this big city of more than 120,000 childlike people who don’t yet know right from wrong, to say nothing of all the innocent animals?”
Gospel: Luke 11:1-4
One day he was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said, “Master, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.”
So he said, “When you pray, say,
Father,
Reveal who you are.
Set the world right.
Keep us alive with three square meals.
Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others.
Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.”
Prayer
God our Father,
you tell us today how Jesus prayed
and taught his disciples to pray,
first and foremost, for the glory of your name,
for the coming and growth of your kingdom,
and for heaven and earth to do your will.
We know that this will is a Father’s will
and so, we ask of you with trusting faith:
Let your will be ours,
let your glory be ours,
let your kingdom of peace and justice,
of love and forgiveness be ours
and let it grow among us, now and for ever. Amen.
