Why present our petitions to God?

Risa Bondoc was born with separated brain lobes. Doctors from Manila and the United States declared that she would never walk or talk and would not live beyond 18 months. Her parents, Carmen and Ditos, implored God to heal her through the intercession of Marie Eugenie, foundress of the Religious of the Assumption. Together with the Assumption Sisters in Rome, they place the infant Risa over the tomb of Mother Eugenie and prayed for God’s healing. Today, Risa, whom I’ve encountered a couple of times, is a bubbly and affectionate 19-year old young lady, full of life and love and gratitude to the Lord for having saved her life.

God hears our prayers. Not just those that involve the miraculous healing from a terminal disease. But even those that involve everyday matters like passing an interview, tolerating a difficult person or surviving a rough day. God hears our prayers big and small.

However, our petitions are not always heeded by the Lord. Otherwise, God would become our ATM dispensing our needs at our bidding. We need to recognize our status as creatures before our Creator who is sovereign over us and not subject to our demands and petitions.

On the other hand, God cares for each of us. God intervenes in history and our lives. As Christians we reject what philosophers call Deism, the belief in a God who has created everything, but has left creation to run on its own. This implies that the laws of nature and human freedom determine the fate of the world and not God. Contrary to the Deist worldview, we present our petitions to the Lord because we believe in a God who sustains and respects the autonomy of creation but also labors to bring it to perfection, a God who respects our freedom, even our penchant to commit sin, yet intervenes to bring about our redemption.

Hence the value of petitionary prayers, of expressing our needs to the Lord. However, this does not mean our petitionary prayers or persistence in prayer, like the woman who pestered the judge in our Gospel reading today, changes the heart and mind of God. God’s will for us is not altered by the perfect recitation of our formula prayers, the completion of our Simbang Gabi Masses, not even by the sincerity of our hearts.  The Lord has plans for each of us. Nonetheless, we present our petitions to express our heart’s deepest longings. Ultimately though, in presenting our needs to the Lord, we also hopefully surrender our will to God. “Lord, this is what I truly desire, but Your will be done. I humbly accept Your will, no matter how inscrutable, for me.”

Even though we cannot control the will of God, Jesus encourages us to present our needs to the Father – and to do so persistently. Why so? In the words of Fr. Vic Baltazar, S.J.: “when we ask, and ask repeatedly we become more aware of the desires that move us. We take notice of the propriety of the things we ask…. In addition, the exercise of asking and having to wait for God’s response humbles us and empties us, makes us realize that everything in our life is gift from God that rests in God’s hands and not ours. Because they are gifts given to us freely, we are invited to dispose of them freely as well. As receivers of God’s gifts, we become ourselves gifts offered by God to others.” GOD’S WORD TODAY Manoling Francisco, S.J.