Jul 25, 2010 / 08:27 am
The “Our Father” helps us to confront the difficulties in our lives, said the Holy Father on Sunday. In reciting the prayer, we never find ourselves alone as our voices are "intertwined with that of the Church."
This Sunday’s Angelus took place amidst the festive atmosphere of Castel Gandolfo’s "Sagra delle pesche," an annual festival celebrating the local peach production. For the occasion, the Holy Father was presented with a basket of local white peaches which were blessed at a nearby parish, shortly before the Angelus.
During his catechesis, the Pope reflected on Sunday’s Gospel from Luke in which Jesus is asked by the disciples to teach them how to pray. To this, Benedict XVI said, "Jesus does not make objections, He does not speak of strange or esoteric formulas, but with great simplicity He says: 'When you are praying, say, “Father...,' and he taught the Our Father, taking it from his own prayer, with which he addressed God, his Father."
We learn these words from St. Matthew's Gospel from the time we are young, he pointed out. "They imprint themselves in our memory, mold our lives, they accompany us up to our last breath. They reveal that we are not already completely children of God, but we must become them and be them ... through our ever deeper communion with Jesus.