GOSPEL REFLECTION, WEDNESDAY, 27TH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME, 7 OCTOBER 2026, OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY

Luke 11:1-4.  Despite the volumes rightly devoted to a wide variety of reflections on the Lord’s Prayer, we have only a few words available for our own comment.   We note that it stands right at the beginning of a lengthy chapter of fifty-four verses in Luke’s gospel concerning prayer and almsgiving.

It was the custom of the rabbis of Israel who had devoted followers to teach them a short distinctive prayer for frequent use.  John the Baptist had done so, as one of Jesus’ disciples said to Jesus  he had been praying, apparently by himself.  In response, Jesus taught them what we now call The Lord’s Prayer.  As his devoted disciples in our present time we treasure that prayer in our liturgies, in our personal prayer, and in our recitation of the rosary as today we celebrate Our Lady of the Rosary.

It is addressed to God the Father, so characteristic of Christian prayer as we see frequently in scripture.  The Father is not one from whom we unwillingly extract gifts and concessions.  He is our Father, the willing source of every grace, every gift and blessing from his infinite abundance.  We acknowledge him in the Kingdom of Heaven and pray that his name be held in reverence among all of us together and in each and every one of our personal lives.  We pray for the coming of his Kingdom among us in all its fullness.  We pray that all of us and each of us become trusting doers of his will alone, as it is now on earth among us now, and as it is already in the Heavenly Kingdom.  The whole of the first part of the prayer holds the Father of All in profound reverence in each of us and all of us.

Only then do we ask for what we need from his abundance because we know that he is the Source of all that is good.  We ask for our collective and personal daily bread, for all that is essential for the continuance of the collective and personal life the Father has already given us in his utter generosity.

Then we ask the Father to forgive our sins; the Greek word for sin here is ‘our debts’ (not our financial debts!!), for forgive us all that we owe him and each other for the offenses each and everyone of us commits – for our personal ones, and for our personal sins but for all of them we do together, for our integrity and our fidelity to the Father and to each other.  We pray not to be led into temptation to sin but to be delivered from all evil, from the challenge we know from our experience that we all face.

The Lord’s Prayer is and immense and comprehensive prayer of adoration to the Father and supplication for all that we lack in relation to his abundant goodness.   If we begin our personal and collective daily prayer with it, all of the rest of our prayer is guided by it.  If we conclude our prayer with it, the whole of our prayer is summed up and offered to the Father just as Jesus taught us and continues to teach us to do.