Oct 12 Thu
It is believed that the Apostle Saint James was assigned to preach the Gospel in the Roman province of Hispania (Spain). After some time preaching, there were no converts. In Saragossa, by the bank of the river Ebro, he was praying, downcast for the lack of results. Then, Our Lady –still alive presumably in Ephesus– heard his prayer, and appeared to him on a stone pillar, offered him consolation, and promised him that the true Faith will not disappear from that land. Quite so; later on, people of that land brought the seed of the Faith to our shores.
We have to pray even though it may seem that God is not listening to our plea. When our Lord seems to be hiding, and our petition seems to go unanswered, that is the time to cry out more resolutely and urgently, like the Canaanite woman who, faced with the Master's apparent coldness, persisted in her request with the humble reply: “yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table.”
Humble, confident, constant petition. “Everything has its time. Our Lord knows perfectly well what our needs are, yet he wants us to ask with the same persistence as the people in the Gospel: ‘Lord, if you will, you can make me clean;’ Domine, ut videam, ‘Lord, that I may see.’ Ask the same way they did: they asked him for everything. I won't say that man's life should be spent in nothing but asking, for there are times when one sees the need to abandon oneself, and one ceases to ask, but later on, one comes back to it.”
“Nowadays, I ask a lot. I keep on asking. After having abandoned myself in God's hands for years, I now consider it better to ask.”
Our Lord always gives in to those who approach him with the desire to please him. His heart is moved when we place in his hands all our needs, desires, and worries. Before the insistent supplication of the Canaanite woman his apparent initial coldness changes to open admiration. "O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire." And her daughter was healed instantly.
Christ is always close by, although at times we don't see him. He is continually listening to us, and lovingly watching us, in spite of the fact that we may not "feel" anything.
We ought, therefore, to persevere confidently in our prayer. The more difficulty we experience in obtaining what we desire, the more firmly we must believe that God will grant it to us. “And when we are assaulted by the violent temptation of discouragement, opposition, struggle, tribulation, a new dark night of the soul, the Psalmist places on our lips and in our minds these words: "I am with you in the time of trial."
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