Dipping into the Catechism63

PRAYER IS FULLY REVEALED AND REALISED IN JESUS FROM WHOM DID JESUS LEARN HOW TO PRAY ?
Jesus, with His human heart, learned how to pray from His mother and from the Jewish
tradition. But His prayer sprang from a more secret source because He is the eternal Son of
God who is in His Holy humanity offers His perfect filial prayer to His Father.
WHEN DID JESUS PRAY?
The Gospel often shows Jesus at prayer. We see Him draw apart to pray in solitude, even at
night. He prays before the decisive moments of His mission or that of His apostles. In fact,
all His life is a prayer because He is in a constant communion of love with the Father.
HOW DID JESUS PRAY DURING HIS PASSION ?
The prayer of Jesus during His agony in the garden of Gethsemane and His last words on
the Cross reveal the depth of His filial prayer. Jesus brings to completion the loving plan of
the Father and takes upon Himself all the anguish of humanity and all the petitions and
intercessions of the history of salvation. He presents them to the Father who accepts them
and answers them beyond all hope by raising His Son from the dead.
HOW DOES JESUS TEACH US TO PRAY ?
Jesus teaches us to pray not only with the Our Father but also when He prays. In this way He
teaches us, in addition to the content, the dispositions necessary for every true prayer: purity
of heart that seeks the Kingdom and forgives one’s enemies, bold and filial faith that goes
beyond what we feel and understand, and watchfulness that protects the disciple from
temptation.
WHY IS OUR PRAYER EFFICACIOUS ?
Our prayer is efficacious because it is united in faith with the prayer of Jesus. In Him
Christian prayer becomes a communion of love with the Father. In this way we can present
our petitions to God and be heard: “Ask and you will receive that your joy may be full”
(John 16:24).
HOW DID THE VIRGIN MARY PRAY ?
Mary’s prayer was characterised by faith and by the generous offering of the whole being to
God. The Mother of Jesus is also the new Eve, the “Mother of all the living”. She prays to
Jesus for the needs of all people.
IS THERE A PRAYER OF MARY IN THE GOSPEL ?
Along with the prayer of Mary at Cana in Galilee, the Gospel gives us the Magnificat (Luke
1:46-55) which is the song both of the Mother of God and of the Church, the joyous
thanksgiving that rises from the hearts of the poor because their hope is met by the fulfilment
of the divine promises.
PRAYER IN THE AGE OF THE CHURCH
HOW DID THE FIRST CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY IN JERUSALEM PRAY ?
At the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles it is written that in the first community of
Jerusalem, educated in the life of prayer by the Holy Spirit, the faithful “devoted themselves
to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life, to the breaking of the bread and to
the prayers” (Acts 2:42).
HOW DOES THE HOLY SPIRIT INTERVENE IN THE CHURCH’S PRAYER ?
The Holy Spirit, the interior Master of Christian prayer, forms the Church in the life of prayer
and allows her to enter ever more deeply into contemplation of and union with the
unfathomable mystery of Christ. The forms of prayer expressed in the apostolic and
canonical writings are still the normal types of prayer for Christians today