I don’t know how you see it, but it seems to me that today it’s hard to find the truth. Just try listening to two messengers. One says – “the complete truth”; the other opposes him – “the absolute truth.” For now, the real truth is knocking on the door like a beggar. Today we heard in the Gospel: “When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will testify about me”. When the Lord speaks into the future, he speaks of the Holy Spirit. His Spirit is the Truth. He says that he will teach his followers the truth.
Jesus even says about himself that he is the Truth. How are we to receive his Spirit of truth? This is probably the first time I have had a true relationship with him. This is built through prayer. Therefore, the basic rule of prayer is its inner truth. The Lord’s demand for piety “in spirit and in truth” could also be formulated as truth in the soul. Above all, we tell God only the truth. That our prayers be in harmony with what we really think, what we really feel, what we want, or what we do not want. To tell God anything else is nonsense. After all, he grants our every desire. He even knows them before they arise. To assume that He does not know what is hidden behind our beautiful words would be a profound insult.
Everyone becomes irritated when someone tries to deceive them. It is as if they consider them so stupid that they do not notice. And yet we do not want our prayers to offend God. But how can we ensure that everything we say in prayer is true in us? Don Bosco’s mother once stopped her older son at the Lord’s Prayer. She did not allow him to continue in his plea, “forgive us our trespasses,” because he would rather not reconcile with little John that day. If everyone who is unable to forgive from the heart remained silent, how many voices would be heard even in a crowded church? How is it that everyone recites these words, or even sings them loudly, and how many of them harbor bitterness from all sorts of real or imagined insults, hold grudges, and long for revenge? And who can truly sincerely pray for the coming of the Kingdom of God? Who cares so much about it? Who wants God’s will to be fulfilled? So how should we pray the Lord’s Prayer so that we speak the truth? And it is not just about the Lord’s Prayer.
We did not invent the texts of the prayers, particularly the prescribed ones. If we want to be truthful, we should adapt them somehow. Otherwise, it would seem as though everyone is saying something different when praying together! However, since God knows even the most hidden thoughts, he knows what we do not say out loud. For example, we can supplement our prayers with an unspoken request: ‘Let us really want it; let us really do it.’ In this way, everything can become sincere truth. Even if I am still consumed by anger over the insult I suffered, I can pray the Lord’s Prayer sincerely. However, I must allow the words of forgiveness to affect me. I must not just rattle them off indifferently. Even if I lack the strength to forgive currently, I must at least force myself to ask for the ability to do so.
Instead of saying ‘I love you’ out loud, we can quietly say, ‘Let me love you.’ We can even add ‘Help my unbelief’ to our profession of faith (Mk 9:24). It is difficult to listen to pious women praying together, for example. ‘Our Father and Hail Mary for sinners,’ ‘Our Father for priests,’ ‘Our Father for our youth,’ and so on, thirty times over. Yet the intention is never expressed in all those repeated Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Even in the ‘Our Father,’ we say, ‘Thy will be done,’ yet perhaps we ask for something that is not God’s will. If we think it is difficult to seek the truth, we should start with ourselves. Let us seek the truth in relation to God.
