The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 346: Meditation and Vocal Prayer

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

Because man is both body and spirit, our prayers can be vocal and meditative. We learn that vocal prayer expresses the movements of our hearts and minds, enabling us to pray with the fullness of our being. Another form of prayer is meditation, which the Catechism tells us is “above all a quest.” In meditation, we employ our thoughts, imagination, and emotions to deepen our union with Christ. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 2700-2708. This episode has been found to be in conformity with the Catechism by the Institute on the Catechism, under the Subcommittee on the Catechism, USCCB. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy Please note: The Catechism of the Catholic Church contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to The Catechism in the Year Podcast, where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us, revealed in Scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in the Year is brought to you by ascension, and 365 days we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church discovering our identity and God's family, as we journey together toward our heavenly home, this is day 346, reading paragraphs 2700 to 2708. As always, I'm using the ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the foundations of faith approach,

but you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. You can also download your own Catechism in a year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash the IY. And lastly, you can click follow or subscribe on your podcast after have your daily updates, and daily notifications today is day 346. As I said, we're reading paragraph 2727.08.

Yesterday we started chapter three, the life of prayer. Remember, we talked about this, that prayer is the life of the new heart, and not to animate us at every moment, but we tend to forget him who is our life and our all. We have to remember, again, one of the things we have to do, always, always, always remember.

So the tradition of the church, we were reminded of yesterday, the tradition of the church proposes to us certain rhythms of prayer. And some like daily rhythms of prayer, like morning and evening prayer, like grace before and after meals, the liturgy of the hours,

having a weekly prayer, Sunday mass, being so critical, right? Today we're talking about expressions of prayer. If you remember yesterday in paragraph 2699, it said that although we have a lot of diversity in prayer, I love the even the line that says, the Lord leads all persons by paths and in ways pleasing to him and each believer responds according to his heart's resolve and the personal expressions of his prayer. So prayer is very, very personal, very individual. However, the Christian tradition has three major expressions of prayer, vocal, meditative, and contemplative. Today, we're looking at those first two, vocal prayer and meditative prayer, meditation. So we will look at those two vocal prayer and meditative prayer. But before that, let's actually pray.

Let's do that right now as we pray in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen, Father, and heaven give you praise and glory. Thank you for bringing us to this day. Thank you for bringing us to day 346 for bringing us to this place where we can hear the teaching of your church in such a brief way on what it is to express vocal prayer, what it is to have

meditative prayer. And you invite us into this Lord, you invite us into this expression of our love for you, of our pleading with you, your expression of praising and glorifying you through vocal prayer. And we ask that you help us to enter it more deeply into meditative prayer, into that silent prayer, that quiet prayer in the depths of our hearts. Lord God, in this day, we ask you to help, help us, make us pray, urge, make us people who pray, people who talk to you and seek you at all times. And Lord, as we heard yesterday, we can't pray at all times unless we pray at certain times. So we ask you, please help us to make the decision, help us to make the choice to spend time just with you.

To spend time just with you in prayer today. Bless this time. Help us to learn more about you and how we can talk to you in Jesus' name. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. It is day 346, we are reading paragraphs 2700 to 2708. Article 1. Expressions of Prayer. Vocal Prayer. Through his word, God speaks to man. By words, mental or vocal, our prayer takes flesh.

Yet it is most important that the heart should be present to Him to whom we are speaking in prayer. Whether or not our prayer is heard depends not on the number of words, but on the fervor of our souls. Volkoprera is an essential element of the Christian life. To his disciples, drawn by their master's silent prayer, Jesus teaches a vocal prayer, the our Father. He not only prayed aloud the liturgical prayers of the synagogue, but as the gospels show,

He raised His voice to express His personal prayer, from exultant blessing of the Father, to the agony of Gethsemane. The need to involve the senses in interior prayer corresponds to a requirement of our human nature. We are body and spirit, and we experience the need to translate our feelings externally. We must pray with our whole being to give all power possible to our supplication. This need also corresponds to a divine requirement. God seeks worshipers in spirit and in truth and Consequently, living prayer that rises from the depths of the soul. He also wants the external expression that associates the body with interior prayer for it renders him that perfect homage which is his due. Because it is external and so thoroughly human, vocal prayer is the former

prayer most readily accessible to groups. Even interior prayer, however, cannot neglect vocal prayer. Prayer is internalized to the extent that we become aware of him to whom we speak. Thus, vocal prayer becomes an initial form of contemplative prayer. Meditation Meditation is above all a quest. The mind seeks to understand the why and how of the Christian life in order to adhere and respond to what the Lord is asking. The required attentiveness is difficult to sustain. We are usually helped by books, and Christians do not want for them. The sacred scriptures, particularly the Gospels,

holy icons, liturgical texts of the day or season, writings of the spiritual fathers, works of spirituality, the great book of creation, and that of history, the page on which the today of God is written. To meditate on what we read helps us to make it our own by confronting it with ourselves. Here another book is opened, the book of life. We pass from thoughts to reality. To the extent that we are humble and faithful, we discover in meditation the movements that

stir the heart and we are able to discern them. It is a question of acting truthfully in order to come into the light. Lord, what do you want me to do? There are as many and varied methods of meditation as there are spiritual masters. Christians owe it to themselves to develop the desire to meditate regularly lest they come to resemble the three first kinds of soil in the parable of the sower. But a method is only a guide. The important thing is to advance with the Holy Spirit along the one way of prayer, Christ Jesus. Meditation engages thought, imagination, emotion, and desire. This mobilization of faculties is necessary in order to deepen our convictions of faith,

prompt the conversion of our heart, and strengthen our will to follow Christ. Christian prayer tries above all to meditate on the mysteries of Christ, as in Lexiotivina or the Rosary. This form of prayerful reflection is of great value, but Christian prayer should go further, to the knowledge of the love of the Lord Jesus, to union with Him. Alright, there we have it, Perigraphs 2700 to 2708. This is just beautiful. And it's just an incredible reminder.

I mean, okay, let's back up. These are two of the three major expressions of prayer. Tomorrow we'll talk about contemplative prayer, but today we have this, as you heard a couple of times already, vocal prayer and meditative prayer. I think this is remarkable just to realize. In paragraph 2700. He says, of course, we're reminded that through his word, God speaks to man. Yes, so for time, we pick up

the scriptures and read. God speaks to us. In that next line, says, by words, mentor or mentor or vocal, our prayer takes flesh. And this is so critical. I mean, when it comes to vocal prayer and and meditative prayer, the reality is we are body and spirit, right? That's what a human being is. We give expression to what's in our heart. We give expression to what's in our mind. We give expression to what's in our soul.

And we do this through vocal prayer through words. And so it's important, I think, the reason I'm emphasizing this is because there are some people who might like really dismiss vocal prayer. And I don't know if I've ever come across as being someone who dismisss vocal prayer, like saying your quote-unquote, saying your prayers, I know I have that quote from my friend, Mike Gormley, who had said, you know, we're not taught to pray, we're taught to repeat. At the same time, the catacasem says that, yes, we need to have those words.

We need to learn how to repeat those words. But the depth of it, paragraph 2700, says so importantly, it's important that the heart should be present to him, to whom we are speaking in prayer. And so it's not a matter of just merely repeating. It's a matter of, okay, these are the words that are an expression of what's in my heart. Remember, we talked about so many times, but it's so essential, in fact, paragraph 27-1 says, vocal purr is an essential element of the Christian life, that we recognize that even the disciples in the gospels,

they saw the master's silent purr. They actually even heard it Jesus, praying out loud in the gospels, raising his voice to express his personal prayer from exalted blessing of the Father to the agony in Gethsemane. So vocal prayer is a good thing. It is something that Jesus himself did and we need to do this. We must pray with our whole being to give all power possible to our supplication. And so that doesn't mean just our voices, it doesn't mean just

our hearts. It means our heart and our voice voices united to each other, which is remarkable. I think this is so, so cool. It goes on to say 27 or 3, this need that we have to pray with our whole self, seems to correspond to a divine requirement that God seeks worshipers in spirit and in truth. And so we have a living prayer that comes from the depths of our soul. But He also wants the external expression that associates the body with interior prayer, because God calls us to active and external worship, not merely interior conversion. And so this is so good. This is so good. The church here in the pachaticism is reminding us, okay, yes, pray with your words and let those words be an expression

of the depth of your heart. And so if you're praying something like the rosary, if you're praying in a holy cards, if you're praying the chocolate, any kind of vocal prayer that you're praying. Again, the Lord's Prayer, that Jesus Himself taught us. All of those are incredibly good. Be attentive, though. Of course, we have to be attentive to make sure that those words are connected to our heart. Now, the next step is meditation. I love this is so powerful. Berkav 27.05, meditation. What is meditation? We're just thinking, well, he says this. Meditation is above all a quest. It's above all a quest.

It's a search. The mind seeks to understand the why and how of Christian life in order to adhere and respond to what the Lord is asking. And it's difficult. The next line says, the required attentiveness is difficult to sustain. And this is so true. If you've ever tried just not just kind of going through your prayers, you know, spraying

the liturgy of the hours or spraying the rosary or something like this, the attentiveness of trying to have this meditative prayer is difficult to sustain. That's one of the reasons why this very paragraph highlights the fact that we typically use sacred books, whether it be the Gospels themselves or the whole Bible itself, or even images will use to help us meditate or liturgical texts or writings of spiritual fathers or books of spirituality. Even I love how it says the last two things, we could look at the book of creation or the book of history. And that's just so remarkable to be able to say, oh, I can reflect on this. I can seek out the Lord in all of these books, but also in creation and in history. I can actually bring my own personal history to my to prayer and meditate on that.

It's just really remarkable. And what's the goal here? Of course, the goal is ultimately going to be Jesus. Let's keep that in mind. The goal is ultimately going to be Jesus. But paragraph 27,06 gives us another target and another kind of another goal here. And I love this. It says, to meditate on what we read helps us to make it our own by confronting it with ourselves. And this is so good. Right? That how many times have you and I ever read a book, maybe even the catacas and maybe even the Bible? And okay, that's great. That's great.

That's great. But we haven't meditated on what we read. We haven't reflected deeply on what we read. And so we just kind of think, oh, that was a nice insight or that was a nice piece of information or I don't even remember what I read. And yet to meditate on what we read helps us to interiorize it, right? It helps us to assimilate it, helps us to make it our own by doing what, by confronting it with ourselves.

And there's something so powerful about that. If you remember, prayed the scriptures. We Lexiutovina is mentioned in paragraph 27-08. If you ever prayed the scriptures where you just have this kind of slow reading of, say, we'll say the gospels. And you take a, say, a parable of Jesus. And you want to apply it to yourself. And you think just for example, the exact same way that in paragraph 2707, it references the parable of the Sower. We know the parable of the Sower that Jesus tells

that Sower goes out to sow. And as he says, he scatters the seed everywhere, right? The seed, some seed falls on the path, some seed falls on rocky soil or shallow soil, some seed falls among thorns and some seed falls on good ground. We can meditate on that. We can just hear that and say, oh, that's neat. Or we can confront it with ourselves and ask that question. Okay. Is my heart like that first soil, the path,

where it doesn't get in there. So this hears God's word. And oh yeah, there are some things God teaches that I just, I don't let them penetrate. I just, the enemy can come by and he can steal them anytime because I have a heart and heart to this teaching of the Lord, to this teaching of the church.

Or you could say the shallow soil and recognize, yeah, that's my heart sometimes too. I get really excited and I have these big plans, but I don't follow through. I don't allow the Lord to take root or as word, to take root deeply in my life to really make a change, or you have the seed that falls among the thorns, the fissils, right? And it gets choked. And Jesus goes on to describe those thorns as the carers of the world, anxieties of the world. And you might meditate on that yourself and say, in my life, are there cares that in anxieties that seem to choke out the life of God in my soul?

See, I love this. To meditate on what we read, help us to make it our own by confronting it with ourselves. And there's something so powerful about taking what I've just heard. God's word or writings of the spiritual fathers insight or even the catacism and reflecting and saying, where is this true in my life? I love it goes on to say, we pass from thoughts to reality. How many times are you ever in a place like again, it plays a prayer, we just start dreaming and just think like, oh, yeah, this is great. That's great, this is the other thing. Here's my big plans for life as opposed to, okay, let's really confront this.

Let's confront these plans, these hopes with myself, with my own heart, with reality, and although that we pass from thoughts, from reality, to the extent that we're humble and faithful, we discover and meditation, the movements that stir the heart and we are able to discern them. And it's a question of acting truthfully in order to come into the light asking Lord, what do you want me to do? Now, as we conclude this day, one of the things we just want to highlight, I just want to highlight is to take the time today in some way, to have some expression of vocal

prayer and some attempt even at meditative prayer. And all that is, is any, there's so many different ways of doing this. I mentioned Lexio D'Avina, where you, a couple of days ago, right, where you read that scripture slowly, then you go again and you just take a little nugget out, like a little bite size piece out of that scripture,

like something you can kind of chew on, meditate on, then talk to God about it, and then have some kind of resolution. What am I going to do with this now? I can force four little simple steps, read through, take a little bite, chew on it, meditate on this, think about it, apply it to yourself, confront it with yourself, talk to God about this, and then make some kind of resolution. How will I move forward with this information in my heart and in my life? Very, very simple. That's just one form. But it's a great form that any of us can do.

And we can actually do it at any point. You could do this as you're driving to be talking to the Lord. And just like, be able to say, okay, today, Lord, I listened to the Catechism in here that talked about the fact that I can meditate on the great book of creation or the book, great book of history, the page of which today is written. And then just talk to God, take a little bite out of history, take a little bite out of this book of creation. She wanted, meditate on it, talk to God about it, and make some resolution. God, what do you want me to do with this? How can I carry this piece

into the future? There's just one way, just one way to do with this? How can I carry this piece into the future? There's just one way, just one way to have to do meditative prayer, but it's a way that invite all of us to do today. I'm praying for you, please pray for me. My name is Father Mike, I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless. you