Prayer book

“ No one should be without a book about Our Lord, His sacred Heart, His blessed Mother, or the saints. No one should be without a book on the Mass. Besides one's prayer-book, one should have manuals of meditation and of instruction on Christian virtues. More extended devotional treatises will keep alive the piety of those for whom they are suitable. ”

“ Formulated prayers are of the nature of magical spells or invocations. A prayer-book is a collection of spells for fine weather, rain, or other blessings. The Catholic soldier takes care to be armed with a blessed scapular to guard off stray bullets, or, in the event of the worst coming, to waft his soul into heaven. The Protestant smiles at this superstition, but mutters a prayer for the self-same purpose. ”

“ While it is perfectly true that the Book of Common Prayer was never designed to be a Treasury of Devotion for individuals, it is equally true that for thousands and hundreds of thousands of our fellow-countrymen who live remote from "Church book-stores," or lack the means of patronizing them, the Prayer Book is, as a matter of fact, their only devotional help. ”

“ This is the best outward prayer-book you can have, as it will turn you to an inward book and spirit of prayer in your heart, which is a continual longing desire of the heart after God. When, for the sake of this inward prayer, you retire at any time of the day, never begin till you know and feel why and wherefore you are going to pray ”

“ At no time in the history of the world has prayer been more urgent and imperative. In attendance at Mass, visits to the Blessed Sacrament, preparation and thanksgiving for Confession and Communion, the use of this prayer book will do much to increase fervor and devotion. And when difficulties perplex, temptations assail and sorrow overwhelms, I am confident that troubled souls will find adequate expression of their spiritual wants in "Moments with the Consoling Christ." ”

“ The Bible is a book of prayers. It is the great prayer-book of the world. All the prayers in it are not on the same spiritual 17level. In many you will find much that is mistaken. But there they are—the prayers of Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, Solomon, Elijah, Hezekiah—all bearing witness to the same need, the same instinct. And I will not confine what I am saying to the men who are mentioned in the Bible. This sense of need is universal. God made man for Himself, and wherever you find man you find his heart and flesh cry out for the living God. ”

“ Unless every clergyman is to settle the form of worship for himself, and there are to be as many forms of worship as there are parishes in the land, who is it that, in his opinion, is to determine what the rubrics of the prayer-book enjoin?—for we suppose him to consider himself bound by the directions of the prayer-book. ”

“ There is no need of attempting to say all the prayers for Mass given in a prayer-book. As regards the following method of assisting at Mass, it combines vocal prayer with meditation. Our aim has been to lead pious souls to devote some time at Mass to mental prayer ”

“ The rosary is the most common and readily understood example of this manner of praying. While we are reciting the Our Father and the Hail Marys of each decade of the rosary, we meditate or reflect on some mystery connected with the life of Jesus Christ or of His blessed Mother.
It is also useful, in using the prayers of our prayer-book, to read them slowly and deliberately, making in the meantime practical reflections on their contents, or pausing from time to time to meditate a little and apply the words of the prayers to our own wants. ”

“ Parliaments, prelates, convocations, synods may order forms of prayer. They may get speeches to be spoken upward by people on their knees. They may obtain a juxtaposition in space of curiously tessellated pieces of Bible and Prayer Book. But when I speak of the rareness and preciousness of prayers, I mean such prayers as contain three conditions—permanence, capability jot being really prayed, and universality. ”

“ And look you get a prayer-book in your hand,
And stand between two churchmen, good my lord; ”

“ There is no need of elegance of expression, to make a prayer acceptable to God. The desire of the heart is its prayer; and that once sincerely turned to God, will certainly receive an answer of peace. When you first awake, strive to fix your mind immediately on God: let the first book you open be the New Testament. There read, not several chapters, but just so much as you find will be food sufficient for present meditation. If the first verse you read particularly affects you, don’t read further, but close the book, and let that verse have its full effect on your mind. ”

“ If we take that manual of worship with which as English-speaking Christians we are ourselves the most familiar, the Book of Common Prayer, and allow it to fall naturally apart, as a bunch of flowers would do if the string were cut, we discover that in point of fact we have, as in the case of the Bible, many books in one. We have scarcely turned the title-page, for instance, before we come upon a ritual of daily worship, an order for Morning Prayer and an order for Evening Prayer, consisting in the main of Psalms, Scripture Lessons, Antiphonal Versicles, and Collects. ”

“ The entire Book of Psalms brings prayer to the front, and prayer fairly bristles before our eyes as we read this devotional book of the Scriptures.
Nor must even Solomon be overlooked in the famous catalogue of men who prayed in Old Testament times. Whatever their faults, they did not forget the God who hears prayer nor did they cease to seek the God of prayer. While this wise man in his later life departed from God, and his sun set under a cloud, we find him praying at the commencement of his reign. ”

“ Forms of Prayer IT appears that the extremest ritualist does not feel wholly bound to his prayer book. The people exercise great liberty in the choice of words or postures when they go to Christ in anxious prayer. Appropriate forms are reasonably sought for varying occasions, and some of the forms of prayer which are venerable for age and sublimity are reverenced and adopted because so often they best express the heart's sincere desire. ”

“ She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that after the damsel had repeated the words of that Holy Tradition the doctor cried, "Thou hast replied aright: now say me, what is prayer?" "Prayer is communion between the slave and his lord, and in it are ten virtues: (1) it illumineth the heart; (2) it maketh the face shine ”

“ He says the Holy Ghost instructs us by degrees; by the book of Proverbs to avoid sin; by Ecclesiastes to draw our affections from creatures; by this of Canticles he teaches perfection, which is pure charity. He explains it mystically. He has five orations On the Lord's Prayer. In the first, he elegantly shows the universal, indispensable necessity of prayer, which alone unites the heart to God, and preserves it from the approach of sin. Every breath we draw ought also to be accompanied with thanksgiving, as it brings us innumerable benefits from God, which we ought continually to acknowledge. ”

“ Many acts and prayers contained elsewhere in this book may be substituted occasionally for those given in the following methods of assisting at Mass, especially such as relate to the Passion, the Blessed Sacrament, and the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
You may also very appropriately recite the Rosary during Mass, and in particular the Eucharistic Rosary in which we meditate on the life, passion, and death of Our Lord in connection with the sacred mysteries of the altar. Formulate your own prayers occasionally.
Converse with God in a familiar manner. Prayer is the elevation of the soul to God. ”

“ Those three classes are found in almost every religious gathering, and it is an intensely interesting thing to observe at close range the various effects of prayer on such a congregation. When the leader of the prayer service approaches the Bible with the manner of a delighted seeker after truth, and, before opening the Book, leads the people in a direct appeal to the Divine Spirit for instruction and inspiration, the interest of the worshipers in the Book is especially awakened. ”

“ If we accustom ourselves to recite our vocal prayers in this way, we shall not only make them our own and pray well, but we shall also gradually acquire the habit of making mental prayer, which tends to unite us more closely to God, and, through the practical imitation of our divine Saviour's virtues, to render us conformable to Him. ”

“ And it was chiefly because of this need for some simple petition for the common people that Jesus at this time consented, in answer to Thomas’s request, to teach them a suggestive form of prayer. Jesus gave this lesson one afternoon in the third week of their sojourn on Mount Gilboa.
2. THE DISCOURSE ON PRAYER
“John indeed taught you a simple form of prayer: ‘O Father, cleanse us from sin, show us your glory, reveal your love, and let your spirit sanctify our hearts forevermore, Amen!’ He taught this prayer that you might have something to teach the multitude. ”

“ Without unction or heart, they fall like a killing frost on all the graces of worship. Death-dealing prayers they are. Every vestige of devotion has perished under their breath. The more dead they are the longer they grow. A plea for short praying, live praying, real heart praying, praying by the Holy Spirit—direct, specific, ardent, simple, unctuous in the pulpit—is in order. A school to teach preachers how to pray, as God counts praying, would be more beneficial to true piety, true worship, and true preaching than all theological schools. ”

“ Abraham Lincoln once said: "I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go; my own wisdom and that of all around me seemed insufficient for the day."
But what is prayer? Has every prayer power with God? Let us endeavour to get some clear ideas on that point. Some people seem to regard prayer as the rehearsal of a set form of solemn words, learned largely from the Bible or a liturgy; and when uttered they are only from the throat outward. Genuine prayer is a believing soul's direct converse with God. ”

“ In condescension to our weakness, our Heavenly Teacher has given us the very words we are to take with us as we draw near to our Father. We have in them a form of prayer in which there breathe the freshness and fulness of the Eternal Life. So simple that the child can lisp it, so divinely rich that it comprehends all that God can give. A form of prayer that becomes the model and inspiration for all other prayer, and yet always draws us back to itself as the deepest utterance of our souls before our God. ”

“ The prayers we read of in scripture, the prayers which opened and shut heaven, the effectual, fervent, energetic prayers of those righteous and holy men of old, which availed so much with God, were all of an extempore nature. And I am apt to believe, if not only our students and ministers, but private christians, were born from above, and taught of God, as those wrestlers with God were, they would not want forms of prayer, though we have such a variety of them, any more than they did. ”

“ Wrapt up in the choicest manner, I found a prayer, which he had himself written. It has been my comfort ever since, when I have grieved, as a mother will grieve for her first-born. Then I could turn to the psalm, which had been my companion in his absence, and say, "Oh! that men would praise the Lord for his goodness! and for his wonderful works to the children of men." How merciful that he was not thrown overboard, without a moment's time to beg favour of God. But if the child of many prayers did, in his sickness, pray himself for salvation, and be heard, what more have I to desire? ”

“ At last she would even kneel down by the bedside, as she had seen the children do, and pray earnestly in a more definite manner.
It was the crying out of a soul in darkness, a prayer true as was that of the publican in the parable. It was a prayer to the unknown God somewhat in this wise:
"O God! if there be a God, O God of Love! God of the Christians! if, indeed, thou art; I love Thee. ”

“ If we have at all seen that prayer is the great need of our work and of the Church, if we have at all desired or resolved to pray more, let us turn to the very source of all power and blessing—let us believe that the Spirit of prayer, even in His fulness, is for us.
We all admit the place the Father and the Son have in our prayer. It is to the Father we pray, and from whom we expect the answer. It is in the merit, and name, and life of the Son, abiding in Him and He in us, that we trust to be heard. ”

“ Consequently the prayers of the psalmist consist of varying moods: complaint, supplication, confession, despondency, praise.
True prayer consists of such elements as adoration, praise, petition, pleading, thanksgiving, intercession, communion, waiting. The closet into which the believer enters to pray is not only an oratory —a place of prayer, it is an observatory—a place of vision. Prayer is not "A venture and a voice of mine ”

“ When we recite the "Our Father" we not merely pray in the name of Jesus, but in His own words. Hence the Lord's Prayer is to God the most pleasing prayer, and for that reason the most efficient and powerful of prayers. It is evident from the history of the Church that the Lord's Prayer has, at all times been held by the faithful in the highest esteem. ”