The How-To Book of Catholic Devotions, Second Edition. Mike Aquilina

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       Introduction

      Did you ever attend a Catholic devotion — the Stations of the Cross, for example, or the Angelus — and find you were the only person who had no idea what to do next?

      Do you ever meet people who seem to pray as if it’s second nature, and wish you could have what they have?

      Do you often wish you had words or gestures to tell God what you really think and feel?

      Do you feel something is missing in your life and suspect it might be prayer?

      If you answered yes to one or more of these questions, congratulations! You’re normal.

      You see, it’s normal for us to want to pray. God built us that way, just as He built us to hunger for the food that sustains us. But sad to say, our world isn’t all it should be, and so it’s normal for us to be clueless about how to go about this business of prayer. Maybe no one ever bothered to teach us. Maybe we didn’t feel like listening when people tried to teach us. Maybe our wouldbe teachers turned us off from prayer, for one reason or another.

      Whatever the reason, we find ourselves, today, longing for something that seems just beyond our reach, yet something that is essential for our lives. The situation can be frustrating. If we were as ill-equipped for eating as we are for prayer, we’d all have starved long ago.

      We need to pray. Yet how should we pray? The simple answer is: We should pray as Jesus taught us to pray. For in Jesus, God became man. He had a body, a soul, a job, a family, a religion, and friends. As both God and man, He held a unique authority on human prayer: He could raise prayers as we do; He could listen as God does.

      His friends detected His expertise, and they asked Him what we would ask Him today: “Lord, teach us to pray” (Lk 11:1; Mt 6:9). He responded by teaching them the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father.

      But He taught them in other ways as well. He taught them by His example. Jesus’ own prayer life was rich and varied. Sometimes He offered formal prayers. We know, for example, that He prayed the Morning Offering of all pious Jews: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mk 12:29-30). At other times, Jesus prayed more spontaneously, raising heartfelt prayers of thanks (Jn 11:41-42). He often took time to pray alone in silence (Lk 3:21-22, 5:16, 6:12, 11:1). Yet He also prayed together with His friends (Lk 9:18). Jesus fasted too (Mt 4:2). He read the Scriptures (Lk 4:16-20) and prayed the Psalms (Mk 15:34). He marked holy days, made pilgrimages, and attended liturgy (Jn 7:10-14).

      The first Christians followed their Lord in these practices, as have all the subsequent generations of believers. As the Gospel spread beyond Jesus’ homeland, Christians adapted the Lord’s habits of prayer to their own cultures and needs. Over time, therefore, the details have sometimes changed, but the forms of prayer have remained essentially the same and just as effective as ever in their power to heal, bring peace, and draw us closer to God.

      Today we call these ways of prayer our devotions, and this book is all about Catholic devotions as they’ve developed in the great Tradition. From a wide variety of sources — saints, popes, and ordinary believers like you and me — we have gathered practical advice on how to pray in the many ways that Catholics pray. In each chapter, you’ll find this good advice arranged to guide you, step-by-step, through a particular traditional practice.

      This is not to say that prayer is merely a technique. No, prayer is a loving conversation. But sometimes conversation proceeds more smoothly with the help of set phrases and even formal declarations. Consider, for example, all the ways in which a husband and wife communicate: formal marriage vows, casual chat, winks across a crowded room, affectionate caresses, and a number of phrases they never tire of repeating.