Mary TV Daily Reflection 3/29/2012

(c)Mary TV 2011 May prayer become a need for you...

March 29, 2012   Dear Family of Mary!   "Dear children! Also today, with joy, I desire to give you my motherly blessing and to call you to prayer. May prayer become a need for you to grow more in holiness every day. Work more on your conversion because you are far away, little children. Thank you for having responded to my call." (March 25, 2012)   "May prayer become a need for you..."   Human beings are needy.     For example, we need food. Our bodies burn up energy and build new cells all the time. The fuel for that activity has to come from somewhere! So we take in our nutrients by eating. We need food.   We need to breathe oxygen rich air. The air we take in infuses that oxygen into our blood stream through which it is delivered to our cells and gives them what they need to use the food/energy we consume. We need air.   We need water. A big part of our body is made up of water, and we need to replace it regularly. Without water, we would die very quickly.   We need to regulate our temperature, and protect ourselves from extreme heat and cold, so we need clothes. We need a place to live where we can manage of all the food, clothes, and other things we need!   Well, you get the idea. We are needy creatures. We depend on so much for our life. Not a moment goes by that we don't "need" something for our existence. Our bodies teach us about needing.   We also need a great deal on the social level. We are social creatures. We need others, to love us, cooperate with us in meeting our "needs", to raise us if we are children, to join us in the journey of life, as a family. We need others.   And in this message Our Lady tells us we need something else. "May prayer become a need for you..." Why does she say it this way? She doesn't say, "May air become a need for you", or "May water become a need for you..." No, we all know that we need these basic building blocks for our bodily life. Our bodies tell us we need them. But prayer? Is it possible that we don't know that we need prayer?   I think it is. Prayer provides the heavenly air we breathe, the living water we drink, the manna from heaven we eat, the protective mantel we receive for our spiritual journey. Prayer helps us to receive the sustaining, life giving stuff for our spiritual life, the life that is eternal. The problem is that we may not be in touch with our spirit, our soul, enough to know that it is starving and dehydrating and freezing and suffocating. We may be ignorant of our soul's need for prayer. And we need our soul/spirit to be fully alive and active in our lives, for it is from our spirit that we receive direction from God for our lives, and grace to be all that God has made us to be. Our lives may be full of problems because we are not in line with God. And we may be blaming our problems on the wrong things. Our poor, suffering soul may be dying from a lack of food, and we blame our subsequent unhappiness on not having enough money, or being too fat, or not having enough friends. You see, our spiritual life may be so neglected that we don't even know it is part of us.   "May prayer become a need for you..." Our Lady wants us to finally realize that we need prayer as much or more than we need food or water or air. We need prayer, because it is the way to life. Our Lady once said, "Let prayer, dear children, be your everyday food, especially when your work in the fields is exhausting you so much that you cannot pray with the heart. Pray, and then you will overcome any weariness. Prayer will be your joy and your rest." (May 30, 1985) It sounds like prayer is more sustaining than sleep, according to Our Lady!   Indeed, prayer powers our lives in the most wonderful ways. Our Lady has said that prayer will be our joy, that prayer provides grace, that we become more beautiful through prayer, that Jesus will give us everything we seek in prayer, that prayer is our food, that prayer will melt the ice in our brother's hearts, that by means of prayer we can defeat evil, etc. Prayer is a need for us.   But, here is the hitch. We will not understand how much we need prayer and how much it will change our lives until we decide for prayer and make a time for prayer every day. We are so desensitized and our spirits are so malnourished that we just don't know what we are missing. But we will never let go of prayer once we try it. It makes life go from black and white to Technicolor!!   "May prayer become a need for you..."   In Jesus, Mary and Joseph! Cathy Nolan  (c)Mary TV 2012

 

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