How do we pray without ceasing?
“How much sugar, Lord?”
Although I do not remember all of the details leading into my conversation with Father Regis some time ago, the words he spoke have stayed with me as a simple reminder of the beautiful intimacy we can have with our Lord when we simply turn our attention to Him. Father Regis told me that whatever task I engaged in throughout the day, perhaps baking a cake or cookies, I should include our Lord in it, by asking Him, “How much sugar, Lord?’
But in the busyness of our days, how often do we bring our attention to our Lord?
We usually cry out to Him in times of distress or need - even those who may have been away from Him for a long time may do so- and may thank Him when we feel He has answered one of those cries. We pray during the specific times of day which we have set aside for that purpose, in Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament, praying the rosary, praying lectio divina with scripture or a devotional, or praying in the morning or before bed, all good and efficacious prayer.
But if we tend to think of prayer as that which happens only in the formal time we have set aside for it, we limit our prayer, limit how our Lord can reveal His love for us and draw us into relationship, into intimate communion with Him.
In her diary, Saint Faustina wrote about Jesus asking her to share with Him about her recent retreat. Rather perplexed, she reminded our Lord that He had been there, too, therefore He already knew. Jesus asked her to tell Him anyway. But our Lord didn’t ask her about the retreat to gain information He already knew.
Our Lord asked her because He desired an intimate sharing of her heart about her experience.
I recently experienced the sweetness of intimacy with our Lord as I stood scraping and scrubbing burned-on cheese from large sheet pans in a too-tiny sink in the corner of a concession booth at an outdoor concert venue filled with 22,000 people.
I heard Brad Arnold, the lead singer of Three Doors Down, ask the question “Who does Jesus love?” calling on the crowd to answer, “I am the one that Jesus loves!”
I smiled and spoke out loud in response, “I am the one that Jesus loves!” feeling the joy of that truth wash over me. With that resonating within me, I took up the task of scrubbing the sheet pans, my attention still on the joy of knowing Jesus and how His love filled me.
Then a line formed, and I got called away from my corner to serve customers, this being the reason I was there and part of God’s will. When I finished and turned to go back to the sink, someone else had taken up my task. I smiled, kindly thanked him, and territorially took back my dirty sheet pan, wanting to go back into the corner alone with Jesus for a few more uninterrupted moments for that private interior conversation that we had begun to have as I shared my heart with Him.
The intimacy was so beautiful that I wanted to keep washing dishes with Jesus.
With practice and God’s grace, our interior prayer will grow into a continuous attentiveness to the nearness of our Lord even through distractions and interruptions, reaching that place of “laying our interior open before the Lord in a way that becomes virtually unbroken,” as Father Boniface Hicks describes in Personal Prayer, when our relationship with our Lord is more continuous as we strive less and surrender more.
Thanks be to God, He has planted the desire for that closeness deeply in my heart.
In Divine Intimacy, Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen tells us that “on earth our search for God and our union with Him are accomplished by means of the will, rather than by the intellect.”
Love is not a feeling, as the culture will try to convince us. It is instead a choice we make with our free will.
As Father Regis invited me, I invite you to make an act of the will to include our Lord Jesus in the everyday details of your life… drawing ever closer to praying without ceasing, entering into the communion with our Lord for which He created us.
For so long I sought God as I imagined Him in Heaven, a place far from me, when truly He was and is within, where I can intentionally turn my attention to Him and ask interiorly, “How much sugar, Lord?"
…knowing well that I am the one that Jesus loves…as are you.
“Whether you eat or drink or speak or converse with persons in the world, or whatever else you do, be ever desiring God and having your heart affectioned to Him...”
Would you please pray a Hail Mary for the soul of Father Regis? Thank you!
References:
Kowalska, Maria Faustina St.. Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska: Divine Mercy in My Soul. Stockbridge, MA: Marian Press. 2012
Acklin, Fr. Thomas, and Fr. Boniface Hicks. Personal Prayer: A Guide for Receiving the
Father’s Love. (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road, 2020.) 58.
St. Mary Magdalen, Fr. Gabriel of. Divine Intimacy: Meditations on the Interior Life for Every Day of the Liturgical Year, trans.
Discalced Carmelite Nuns of Boston. (Rockford, IL: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc. 1996.) 38-39.