The Our Father: the revolutionary Prayer of the Kingdom
Joseph Mattam, SJ
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The
Our Father, the prayer most commonly used by Christians, is probably
the only one taught by Jesus; it is a picture of the Kingdom, the new
type of life that Jesus envisaged. To understand this prayer better, we
need to look at the introductory and concluding verses in Matthew's
version. Jesus begins by saying: “And in praying do not heap up empty
phrases..your Father knows what you need before you ask him." (Matt
6.6-7). And He concludes:”…if you do not forgive men their trespasses,
neither will your Father forgive your trespasses" (6.14-15). If this
prayer, then, is not a matter of "empty words" to inform God what we
need but is a matter of forgiving one another, then I suggest that it
expresses a fourfold relationship: to God, one another, things and to
structures. It is both a confession of who we are and a promise to
become what we profess to be. Like all prayers of petition, this is the
expression of the truth of ourselves and of our commitment to bring
about God's rule on earth. This prayer is a programme of life and it
expresses the very meaning of Christian life.
Our Father in Heaven
The first phrase is a summary of the whole prayer. It expresses our
relation to God, to one another, to the earth and to the structures. In
Jesus' time people considered God as living ‘in heaven'; perhaps by
saying that God is ‘heavenly', Jesus distinguishes God from our earthly
parents. Also the term ‘Father' need not be taken in a male sense; it
expresses the type of relation we ought to have to our Source whom we
may call Father/Mother. As the rays of the sun depend totally on the
sun, we depend on God for our very being and these words affirm that our
attitude to God ought to be one of loving obedience and trust, not a
relation based on greed, fear or obligation. In fact, we ought to relate
to God as children - in loving obedience; we want to pray
because we want to be in conscious and intimate communion with our
Father/Mother. Besides this affirmation of our relation to God, we
affirm that we are all brothers/sisters, owners of the Earth that
belongs to the Parent. In our world, with all types of discriminatory
relationships based on caste, colour, gender, religion, race and
nationality, this is a truly revolutionary statement. As children of the
same Parent, we owe each other love and respect. Each has a distinct
function in society, but this does not place one above or below the
other. There is no superior class or race. Every type of relation that
is opposed to this basic truth stands condemned.
The earth is of God and therefore, is meant for all God’s children; it
is not just for a few children or a few nations. For, according to the
Bible, human beings and the earth are intimately inter-connected and so,
cannot be separated. Any ideology that justifies the accumulation of
wealth by some by depriving others of land, house and food is contrary
to the faith expressed by these words. Anyone who tries to justify the
present system as "God's will" is denying God as Father/Mother of all,
an atheist. This profession of who we are is a promise to bring about a
new social order where all will share the earth of God as
brothers/sisters, without any discrimination.
Holy be Your Name:
What was confessed and promised in the first phrase is explicated here.
It is our privilege as children to keep God's name sacred, revered and
respected by all in the way we relate to God, to one another and to the
earth. God is not honoured merely by singing God’s praises, or by saying
“holy”, or offering worship in the churches and temples, but by God’s
children living truly as brothers/sisters, in love and justice. Just as
good sons and daughters keep their parents’ name sacred and revered, we
honour God when we relate to God and to one another lovingly. If, on the
contrary, we build walls of separation among ourselves and if a few of
the children enjoy all or most of the wealth of the Parent, while the
others are left to starve and die in misery, then we dishonour God’s
name. Any form of discrimination on the basis of caste, race, gender,
nation and religion is also an insult to the Father's name. The
so-called believers in God have been the chief cause of the growth of
atheism.
Your Kingdom come, Your Will be done on earth, as in heaven
What we desire here and commit ourselves to is to actualize God's dream
for the earth. When God created this earth, God had great dreams for
this "daughter", for all her potentialities, for all that she could
become. God certainly would have dreamt this earth to be a place where all God’s
children could live happily. The Kingdom of God is not a special place,
but the transformation of the present earth and of humans and their
relationships. It is the radical re-orientation of our life, a radically
new vision of reality. It is a negation of the present as final. The
Jewish people spoke of the actualization of the promises of God in terms
of the Kingdom of God, the rule of God, which would bring justice to
the victims of society.
This Kingdom does not come through the use of power, but through the
revelation of the unconditional love of God. Jesus manifested in his
life that the acceptance of this truth, namely belief in God's love, is
what liberates him from greed, lust, hatred, fear, poor self-image,
legalism and ritualism and enables him to love all. Loving in an unjust
world would necessarily mean taking sides with the victims of society;
hence we may say that the Kingdom of God that Jesus proclaimed would
imply freedom, love and justice. We commit ourselves to create such a
society, which whiles it is a gift, is also our task. We have to take
sides, we have to decide in favour of the Kingdom of God and give up
allegiance to other kingdoms based on prestige, possessions, success and
exploitation (see Lk 16.1-10; Lk 14.16-24; Mk 12.28-34). The Kingdom is
a gift and at the same time a task, because it is our task to manifest
God's love in our effective loving which, in an unjust world, requires
`repentance', a change of life, a changed social relationship.
Recognizing that God is not paternalistic, but has entrusted the world
to us, we will have to work to eliminate the injustices that prevail in
our world and create a more humane and a just world where all can live
in harmony and truly call God `Father/Mother'. God brings about God’s
rule through our loving, our opposition to forces that are contrary to
God’s will and dream. So, we pray that God’s will may become a reality
on earth. It is not something for the after-life, but for this world of
ours.
Give us this day our daily bread:
Jesus expresses the reality of the Kingdom in terms of bread for all,
forgiveness, mutual protection and creation of structures that are
helpful for all. Jesus tells us that God is interested in our basic
necessities of life: food, (clothes, shelter), forgiveness and
protection. He tells us that the first requirement of the Kingdom is
that all have "bread". "You give them something to eat", Jesus told His
disciples when people were found without food; He did not tell them to
pray to God instead. We note also that the first thing mentioned in the
last judgment is: I was hungry…(Matt 25.31ff).When Jesus tells us that
the Father feeds the birds of the air, we know that God does so through
their efforts; so, much more truly we ought to realize that God does not
do things instead of us; the earth has been entrusted to God’s children
who will have to care for it, develop it and make it good for all.
Hence, our prayer for bread is a reminder for us to share our bread, to
provide bread for all through our caring, sharing and creating
structures that help such a distribution; so that, what was said of the
first Christians be true of all: "There was not a needy person among
them" (Acts 4.34). Just as God gives us life through our parents, God
provides for all God’s children through what we do for ourselves and
others.
Jesus also reminds us by the use of the word daily
that what is required is not a system of hoarding and accumulation. In
today’s world, the capitalistic system of competition and hoarding is
considered to be just and necessary. But even in the OT, when people
were given the manna, they were told not to hoard for the morrow. Jesus
spoke strongly against hoarding (Lk 12.16-21), about the dangers of
wealth (Lk 16.19-31; Mk 10.25) and insisted on sharing (Mt 5.42). The
early Christians too thought that it was possible, though their
experiment lasted only for a short while. This hint of Jesus, at least,
invites us to look for alternative patterns. "Give us our daily bread",
then, is a promise to share the earth and its produce with all, a
promise not to hoard at the cost of another; it is against the luxuries
of any type when even one person remains hungry and unfed, without
clothes and shelter.
Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
The Jews believed that only God could forgive sins: "Who can forgive
sins but God alone?" (Lk 5.21) hence in this petition alone is the human
responsibility explicated. Jesus makes it explicit that even what is so
exclusively God's privilege is now carried out through us. Almost like
an after-thought, to emphasize the centrality of this theme, Jesus
concludes the prayer by repeating the message of this petition. We need
to forgive others in order to experience God's forgiveness. It is
not a condition on God's part, but a condition for us to experience
God’s forgiving, unconditional love. God continues to love us even when
we turn away from God. Hence, this petition is not a matter of
conditions for obtaining God’s forgiveness, but is a call for us to
become like God in our relation to one another. This petition explicates
that our inter-personal relationship ought to be characterized by
unconditional love, for forgiveness is another name for unconditional
love. Jesus places forgiveness on an equal footing with our need for
food.
In our world, people are so much governed by various forms of
conditioning and hence, act from prejudice, partial or wrong information
received, from their need to protect themselves, from fear, from the
illusion of improving others etc; but their actions can be harmful;
these can be misunderstood by others. Due to such misunderstandings,
judgment and blame follow. Hence there arises the continual need for
forgiveness, as Jesus Himself says: "seventy times seven" (Matt 18.22).
Misunderstanding and judgments create Towers of Babel, walls of
separation. Understanding and forgiveness create new channels of
communication. Mutual forgiveness and love are to be the characteristics
of Jesus' disciples (Jn 13.35.
While the sacrament of reconciliation is very necessary for the Church
to continue as a community of brothers and sisters, the understanding of
that sacrament in the past has perhaps done harm to this more
fundamental teaching of Jesus on mutual forgiveness. When a person
forgives another, both benefit by that action; perhaps the one who
forgives is the first beneficiary of that action, for by his/her
non-forgiveness, he/she does harm to own self.
Lead us not into temptation
The temptation is against the values of the Kingdom, namely, of sharing
and forgiving. This petition then is a promise to live by the values of
the Kingdom, by not hoarding but sharing, by not hating and creating
walls of separation but by forgiving. To share, to let go of one's own
interest and forgive, as well as to live according to the values of
Jesus is difficult in a world where `worldly values' reign supreme;
where possessing, hoarding, grabbing, dominating and having power over
others are considered to be the most important thing - the means of
being regarded as someone. By having more and more one gives the
illusion of being happier and thus tempts others too to follow that path
of grabbing and accumulating.
Deliver us from evil:
The last part of the petition speaks of mutual protection. In Jesus'
time, the apocalyptic world-view held that all evil came from Satan and
hence, Jesus claimed, "But if it is by the finger of God that I cast out
demons, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you" (Lk 11.20). Given
this world-view, He was undoing the power structures that kept people
enslaved in one form or another. The prayer then is aimed at the removal
of the power structures that enslave and dehumanize. It is too
simplistic today to say that demons are keeping people enslaved. The
political, economic, social and religious structures on the one hand,
and the internal structures of greed, hatred, lust, fear and poor self-
image, on the other hand dehumanize and enslave people today. One may
also understand the petition in a general sense as referring to the need
of mutual protection. God protects us through what we do for ourselves;
we have to make it possible for all to live without fear. Hence, the
prayer becomes a promise to create structures that help the well-being
of all and also to help to free people from the internal unhealthy
structures of greed etc: a call to personal conversion and to work for a
better and more humane social structure, which is already implied in
the earlier petition : "Your Kingdom come".
Conclusion
This prayer of the Kingdom, then, proposes to us the manifold
relationships that make up our life: inter-personal relations
characterized by unconditional love; relation to things characterized by
not hoarding, but sharing; and finally, creating structures that help
all to live fearlessly and be beneficial to all. Through these threefold
relations, we express our relation to God as Father/Mother, we honour
God’s name, we bring about His/Her Kingdom on earth and we carry out
His/Her will on earth. The loving relation to God is manifested
precisely in the way we relate to one another, to things and to
structures. In other words, when we truly love one another, we share our
bread, we protect one another and we create conditions that are helpful
to all. The goal of our life on earth is that we love as God loves.
When we see this prayer as demanding such a serious commitment, we
understand why in introducing this prayer at the Eucharist, the priests
usually say, "We make bold to say Our Father". We do need courage to
say this prayer if we mean what we say, namely, a promise to God and to
one another to make real God’s dream for us and for the earth.
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