How to Overcome Dryness in Prayer (feat. Fr. Michelangelo)

however sometimes we think good prayer is when I feel really close to God when I get these great spiritual Delights or we call them consolations that isn't necessarily good prayer hey I'm Father Mark Mary and I'm father Michelangelo We Are The Franciscan fers with Rule and this is ension presents father Michelangelo's with us again uh before he moves down to hondur where he'll start his life as a priest and today he's going to talk to us a little bit about dryness of prayer kind of understanding some of the causes of it and how we can respond first I think it's very helpful to Define what is prayer so prayer is the raising of the soul to God to Give Him worship to ask his pardon to give him thanks for the things he's given us and then to ask for new Graces in the future for good things and we can also Define it a little bit more narrowly by just the asking of good things from God the purpose of this is to ask for Graces for our Salvation the salvation of others and then to cooperate with those graes to become better prayer does not change the mind of God but it's meant to change us I am changing I am becoming more humble I'm becoming more obedient and my will is being conformed to the will of God and so I desire to do the will of God in all things and that is what good prayer is however sometimes we think good prayer is when I feel really close to God when I get these great spiritual Delights or we call them consolations that isn't necessarily good prayer sometimes that goes along with good prayer when it makes us more humble more obedient more charitable more likely to do God's will but it doesn't necessarily mean it's good prayer and what we call dryness of prayer is when we don't feel those uh good feelings those Pious feelings feeling close to God and we don't really feel his presence and sometimes we'll say oh I the prayer was really bad I didn't feel God but that's not really the case it's just that those feelings aren't there it's kind of like losing your sense of taste and eating food so we still are nourished by the food the food still has effects we just don't taste it so a a way to remember spiritual dryness on three levels are the following categories and the first spiritual cookies the second the sources possible sources of spiritual dryness and the third the Saints approach to it and so the first level happens kind of in the beginning of the spiritual life when we turn back to God or a conversion a reversion when we first start to take our faith seriously God often gives great consolation and I call them spiritual cookies and so in a way it's positive reinforcement to detach us from our previous life of sin and to attach us to draw Us close to him and so in the same way that maybe when you were young your mom gave you a cookie for cleaning your room so it's positive reinforcement but as you got older at some point your mother realized okay now my son or daughter is mature enough and they don't need this cookie in order to do the right thing God kind of does the same things and the purpose is so that we don't become attached to the Fe the good feeling but we do it out of love for him part of that is to withdraw these kind of spiritual cookies these consolations and so really the dryness of prayer is a good thing because God is saying I think this soul is mature enough to continue in prayer um without these great consolations and so what we do when this happens is just what I said we can continue in prayer we accept it we receive it as as a humility as and we desire to become more humble and to cooperate with God's grace and so that's the first level the second level is to understand that this dryness can come from three sources so it can come from God and we just talked about that it can also come from our human nature and it can also come from our spiritual enemies so in this second understanding as we progress God will use use um this dryness kind of in the same way as the first level but kind of for more Precision so we have some venial sin that we're still involved in or there's a little bit of self-complacency or um a little bit of spiritual Pride coming up because I'm progressing in the spiritual life and so God will use this dryness of prayer to again draw our attention to what is most important in the spiritual life the second part from ourselves as a soul body composite it our soul and our body are connected and if the body is exhausted from a lot of work or from um mental exhaustion it it can be very difficult to pray and this can come through as dryness in prayer also if maybe I spend all day on social media my mind has become so dissipated that it's difficult to concentrate on prayer and so this dryness of prayer can be the result of just being exhausted and the third one is our spiritual enemies who can cause dryness or they can insert themselves into the dryness that God is allowing and try to trick us or to change our perspective on it and they it sounds like this your prayer is so worthless God is not listening to you just give up because their motto is anything but prayer and so they'll try to convince you that it's not worth praying if the prayer isn't filled with these consolations and then the third um so what we do um on this level is to not spend a ton of time trying to figure out where it came from but we do a brief examination of conscience and I think the best way to do it is to look at what are the fruits of this dryness am I becoming um more humble am I becoming more obedient am I becoming more resolved to the will of God and if so remain in that place and if I discover that this dryness is causing bitterness um I'm angry all the time then A change is necessary we look at okay am I becoming very um impatient so we try to practice the opposite virtue of patience and so that quick examination of conscience where I'm asking myself what are the effects of this dryness and then acting accordingly so it's what we do with it and understanding dryness on the third level is really the prerogative of the Saints and the Saints understand that in fact dryness turns the Merit meter all the way up St Francis de Sales said that 1 ounce of dry prayer is greater than 100 pounds of prayer and consolation why because it is out of pure love for God that we continue in it and there's nothing of a self-love or a self-satisfaction that I'm seeking in the prayer and so Saints like Padre Pio said that they can no longer suffer because the suffering becomes a consolation for them because they know that this is the place where where souls are sprung from purgatory where where the prayer merits conversions and we see this in a very um stinct way with Jesus on the cross so Jesus did not feel the presence of God he says father why have you abandon me right and he's on the cross and he says I thirst this dryness but he this thirst is a thirst for souls and he understands that this place uh of pray prayer is what marit the greatest Grace is we understand on this level that the that um the dryness and prayer is actually can be a great thing and can be um the source of the greatest Graces amen I love that uh I've never really kind of um made the connection between Jesus thirst on the cross and dryness in prayer and and I think that's a beautiful way to kind of if you will the the wisdom of the cross that in these in the in the sacrifice there's there's great power in that um so thank you again father Michelangelo for being with us and uh praying for everybody pray for us as we all struggle to persevere in prayer and we will see you again next week remember we are pilgrims on the Sur P poco poco little by little B we're going to make it see yall great and so in the beginning um we may seek the god um we may seek God's consolations more than the consolations of God is that no we often seek the consolations of God more than the god of consolations

Channel: Ascension Presents

Views: 5,119

Keywords: cfrs, franciscan friars of the renewal, fr. Mark-mary, fr mark mary, father mark-mary, catholic monks, catholic friars, ascension, ascension press, ascension presents, fr. Mike, father mike, catholic advice, catholic inspiration, catholic motivation, spiritual dryness catholic, struggles with prayer, prayer, new to prayer, God, close to God, Jesus, pray to Jesus, deeper in prayer, new prayers, church prayers, how does prayer work, does prayer work?, god won't answer me, Love

Id: AN9TDwM139I

Length: 8min 39sec (519 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 24 2024