Saturday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time
When roses are dried and compacted, often the scent is all the sweeter. For, although the flower is more beautiful when fresh, the desiccated florals often have a more concentrated fragrance. Similarly, when prayer seems dry and arid, that time may be less satisfying to ourselves; nevertheless, those moments are often more precious to God because the faith and love of our hearts must be all the more concentrated in order to overcome the weariness that might arise.
In the Gospel today, Jesus speaks of the great necessity for perseverance in prayer by offering the parable of a woman who persistently appeals to a judge for a just decision. If even the judge eventually listens to the woman’s request, how much more will God give to all what is good and just since they cry out to him day and night! But even though we know the importance of this perseverance in prayer, at times we can still find it hard to show up persistently. When prayer seems empty and God seems far away, our natural reaction is to fill our time with other things. However, when we are experiencing these moments, that is when we need prayer the most.
But what then are we to do? Having learned much from his own personal experience, St. Ignatius was well aware of the temptation of the evil spirit to suggest cutting the time for prayer short. And the advice that he recommends is to be bold in resisting. And particularly this saint suggests that if we find ourselves wanting to skip prayer or leave prayer earlier than we had originally resolved, we must not only resist this thought; but we must overthrow it by doing the opposite. Rather than stopping short, Ignatius suggests that we remain a little longer than we had originally planned. Then, after having concentrated the faith and love of our hearts to make this act, we can be reassured that the Lord will see to it that justice is done speedily for us.