The Rosary in a Year (with Fr. Mark-Mary Ames) - Day 8: Our Father in Heaven

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

How do you approach God when you pray the Rosary? Fr. Mark-Mary begins exploring the Biblical Roots of the Rosary with the Our Father by comparing the story of Jacob and Esau in Genesis 32 to Jesus’ words to his Father as he teaches us the Lord’s Prayer. Understanding how we can approach God will give us a strong foundation for praying the Rosary. Today’s focus is “Our Father who art in heaven” and we will be praying one Our Father, three Hail Marys, and one Glory Be. For the complete prayer plan, visit https://ascensionpress.com/riy.

Hi, I'm Father Mark May with Franciscan Friars of Renewal, and this is the Rosary in a Year podcast where through prayer and meditation, the rosary brings us deeper into relationship with Jesus and Mary. It becomes a source of grace for the whole world. The Rosary in a Year is brought to you by Ascension. This is day eight. To download the prayer plan for Rosary in a Year, visit AscensionPress.com forward slash rosaryinayear or text R-I-Y to 33777.

You'll get an outline of how we're going to pray each month and it's great with a track of progress. The best place to listen to the podcast is in the Ascension app. There are special features built just for this podcast and also recordings of the full Rosary with myself and other friars. On behalf of myself and the team here at Ascension, we wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who's helped support this podcast financially. Your support is so appreciated and helps us to reach as many people as possible.

And if you haven't already, please consider supporting us at ascensionpress.com forward slash support. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. So we're entering into day one of phase two of Rosary in the Gear podcast called the Biblical Roots of the Rosary. And so, what we'll be doing is taking, for example, the different prayers that we say when we're praying the rosary and slowly work through them. Either they are scripture or we'll root them in scripture.

And then we'll go on to the particular scripture passages appropriate to the different mysteries and just spend some time working through these and reflecting on them. For example, the next couple of days were me going through the Our Father. So the approach that we'll be taking is I'm going to begin each episode, read part of the prayer or the article of the Creed, etc. that we're going to be reflecting on for that day. And then I'll propose a scripture passage that is going to be sort of the lens to begin the conversation. At the end of each episode, we're going to be building up our prayer muscle. So at the end of each episode for this phase, we'll say the sound of the cross and then we'll pray in our Father, three Hail Marys and a Glory Be and close the episode for the day.

Today, as I sort of began, we're going to be looking at our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. The scripture passage, I'm going to be looking at, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. The scripture passage, I'm going to make it make sense. Every now and then I give homilies for the sister of life or celebrate mass for them. And one of the sisters said, Father, I got to be honest, your homilies, sometimes I don't know where you're going, but then you always bring it in and it makes sense. So here's, I think, one of those. So stick with me here.

We're going to Genesis chapter 32, starting at verse 13. The context here is, it's the story of Jacob and Esau. And as we remember, Jacob got the birthright that was proper to Esau. And so Esau is mad at him. So here's what's going on. So he lodged there that night, referring to Jacob, and took from what he had with him,

a present for his brother Esau. 200 she goats and 20 he goats, 200 ewes, 20 rams, 30 milch camels, goes on with the number of these animals. Then it says, then he delivered into the hand of his servants every drove by itself and said to his servants, pass on before me and put a space between drove and drove. He instructed the foremost when Esau, my brother, meets you and asks you to whom do you belong, where are you going and whose are these before you, then you shall say, They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present sent to my lord Esau, and moreover he is behind us.

He likewise instructed the second and the third and all who followed the droves. You shall say the same thing to Esau when you meet him. And you shall say, moreover, your servant Jacob is behind us. For he thought, I may appease him with the present that goes before me, and afterwards I shall see his face. Perhaps he will accept me." All right, Father Mark Mary, make it make sense. What my proposal is, is what is happening in the opening words of the Our Father and what's happening in the passage I read from the book of Genesis is the same thing,

just in a totally different way. Both scripture passages depict essentially one person approaching another or instruction on how one person approaches another. Like the approach is modified and customized and quite different depending on who I'm meeting and my relationship to that person.

For example, like when I meet an old friend, like a buddy, I greet them one way, which is going to be quite different than when I approach a boss. How I approach my parents is going to be one way or how somebody might go to a job interview is going to be quite different as well. And somebody who, you know, maybe I've hurt, like if I've hurt somebody and they have a grievance against me, again, I'm going to go to that person. I'm going to change and modify appropriately. So how I approach that person, Jacob and Esau,

we have Jacob approaching Esau who's mad at him. He approaches through this very, very kind of big caravan of gifts all night. Why? Because his brother's mad at him and Jacob is afraid. It's very fear driven. Now let's contrast that with how Jesus teaches us to approach God when he gives us the Our Father. When you pray, he doesn't say approach God like somebody who's really mad at you, to whom you owe a great debt.

He doesn't say, like, come with great fear. At the same time, you don't come to God just the way you would, like your bro or like a wish granting genie. When you come to God, when you pray, say, our Father. And as when you come to like a father, you come with reverence, you come with adoration, but also you come with the freedom and the confidence of a child coming to his father or her father who loves you.

When you come, come quite simply. Bring your intentions, bring your needs, bring your whole heart, bring your whole person, but just come simply and say, our father. One of my like favorite childhood memories is when I would go with my dad, I was like six, seven, eight. I'd go with my dad on Saturdays to his office. My dad is a very, very successful attorney.

He's got all the different attorney awards and he's got his like name, you know, on the wall when we come in. He's the managing partner of this firm and he is the boss. But he's my dad. And I would just go right as a little son into the office quite different than the way in which other people who work there

are going to be approaching him, whether it's employees, clerks, secretaries, clients, partners, etc. I would approach him just as a son approaches him with confidence and knowing I'm loved. And I would just hang out in his office, totally free. And later on, I'd work there as like a file clerk. By the way, I was very bad at it. And all I had to do is put stuff in files in alphabetical order,

which I was able to screw up. Nonetheless, when other people, when the clerks, the other partners, the secretaries, the clients, like when they were in my dad's office, they're on, you know? And there's very much, okay, here's what like you need from me,

or here's what I need from you. There's a lack of freedom. And there's a particular nature to, if you will, that transactional sort of professional relationship. Like he had the authority, he had the power, he was the boss. But my primary approach to him, relationship to him, was one of a son to his father who loved him. And so I think there's something to this, right? Like, yeah, God is mighty.

God is all powerful. God has the authority. His name is hallowed. Amen to that. But also, Jesus wants us to come quite simply, quite humbly, quite freely. Let's come as sons and daughters to our Heavenly Father. So what we'll pray about today is just think about your relationship with God and how do you approach Him? Do you approach Him as a loving Father,

as the best of fathers, as someone who loves you? Or do you approach him as somebody who's mad at you, to whom you owe a debt? Do you approach him as like, you know, a genie? But just go ahead and reflect on that. And ask it to be purified. And so when we, you know, as the liturgy says, when we dare to pray our Father, let us come simply, totally, completely, humbly, confidently as a child comes to His Father. So let us pray in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary,

full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.