A gift from Father Charlie

Posted by Ginger

Embracing the Word in the New Year

"A soul without prayer is a soul without a home."

Abraham Joshua Heschel

I believe one of the greates gifts that Fr. Charlie left us, here at St. Raphael's was the gift of prayer and the good instruction on how to pray more effectively. 
Last year, Fr. Charlie was asked by Suzanne Nelson (our wonderful Coordinator of Adult Faith Formation) to do a Scripture Study Course....and in his faithful 'yes' Fr. Charlie brought to us a two part scripture study course using the resource by Stephen Binz.  The two books used were "the Mass in Scripture" and "Learning to Pray in Scripture". Stephen Binz's writings use the Lectio Divina framework, an approach to prayer that was somewhat new to me.  In helping me develop a deeper prayer life, one of the greatest things I took away from Stephen Binz's books was the dispositions of the heart (p. 25 in Learning to Pray in Scripture). Understanding the dispositions of the heart helped prepare me to better be able to receive that gift of friendship with Christ. 

 Two specific things were big keys to unlocking my heart:

1. First, understanding that prayer is God's beautiful gift to us. Prayer was something I took for granted; sorta like the GPS system on my phone.  It was there for me and very easy to use.  But somehow, I never took the time to learn it, or even ask someone who did know how to use it, to explain it to me.  And all the while I kept getting lost.  I can't tell you how many U-turns I would take.  Not a lot of fun with four screaming kids and flying Cheetos. 

"Prayer is both a gift of God's grace and a resolute response on our part.  It requires that we develop within ourselves a receptivity to God's gift and also the necessary virtues that enable prayer to flourish.  If we do not want prayer to be simply an intermittent emotional response, we must work at prayer by cultivating the dispositions that enable the gift of prayer to develop within us."

Stephen Binz, Learning to Pray in Scripture

The words gift, resolute response and receptivity are the words that jumped out at me.  If God is so generous to give us a gift, available to us all the time, and I don't respond, receive or even take the  time to open the gift...then like like my GPS, I remain without a compass....or a day full of U-turns.

2. The second most valuable thing I learned from Stephen Binz's Scripture Study course, was a deeper understanding of what it meant to develop those dispositions of the heart.  The five dispositions of the heart to nurture within ourselves are:

- Repentance

- Humility

- Confident Trust

- Sincere Integrity

- Perserverance

The last one, Perserverance..."keep awake and pray" ...is what keeps one steadfast in prayer; so that the habit of prayer can create a permanent home within our souls.  

Thank you Fr. Charlie for introducing us to Stephen Binz and all of his wonderful works.  

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