Catechism: Jesus in prayer, a window into his heart
Catechism Commentary 62
It is moving to think of Jesus humbly going off to pray alone. For example, in Mk 1:35 we are told that, “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went to pray.” It is quite possible that when he did so he would pull his cloak over his head and enter the tabernacle of his heart which was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit. There he would talk to his Father and listen to him. As a person with a divine nature Jesus was completely at one with his Father. As he attested, “I and the Father are one" (Jn 10:30). On another occasion he said, “No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son” (Mt 11:27). This implies that unlike Moses his predecessor, who only enjoyed an indirect awareness of God, Jesus beheld God’s glory face to face and was constantly aware of his infinite love for him. Pope Benedict XVI has written, “What was true of Moses only in a fragmentary form has now been fully realized in the person of Jesus: He lives before the face of God, not just as a friend, but as a Son; he lives in the most intimate unity with the Father.”
Whenever Jesus prayed he did so in the context of a vivid awareness of the love that the Father had for him. Speaking about that love Pope Paul VI said in his apostolic exhortation Gaudete in Domino , “He knows that He is loved by His Father . . . This certitude is inseparable from the consciousness of Jesus. It is a presence which never leaves Him all alone It is an intimate knowledge which fills Him: "...the Father knows me and I know the Father" (Cf. Jn. 16:32). It is an unceasing and total exchange: "All I have is yours and all you have is mine" (Jn 10:15).” As a result, Jesus enjoyed the beatific vision in his human nature. It is significant that the scriptures clearly attest that, as a person with a human nature, he grew in knowledge like the rest of us (Cf. Lk 2:22; Heb 4:15).
Peter, James and John had an intimation of Jesus’ direct awareness of the Father’s glory when Jesus was transfigured on Mount Tabor. We are told that, “His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light” (Mt 17:2). In virtue of the hypostatic union Jesus had a divine nature equal to that of his Father, but as someone with a human nature he was subordinate in role. That is why he could say, “the Father is greater than I” (Jn 14:28). Although Jesus had a human nature like us, he was unlike us in so far as he was sinless (cf Heb 4:15), and therefore experienced no inner obstacle or resistance to the voice of his Father.
No doubt Jesus poured out his love, thoughts, feelings and desires to the Father in his prayer. For example, on one occasion he prayed, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure” (Matt 11:25-26). In the course of his prayer, the Father poured out his love, thoughts and feelings to Jesus. In this way the Father’s presence and desires were experienced directly by him. He testified, “What I speak, I speak just as the Father has told me” (Jn 12:50). The Father also told Jesus what to do. He said, “Very truly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise” (Jn 5:19).
Jesus’ own prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane is about as near to a perfectly balanced template as one could find. On the one hand it affirms that God can act with power, even to the point of miracles, while at the same time accepting that such miracles are not always part of God’s saving plan. As St Paul was later to say: “For Jews demand signs…but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews…but to those who are called….Christ the power of God” 1 Cor 1:22-24. Sharyn Dowd summarizes the balance very well when she writes: “The power of the scene in Gethsemane is to be attributed to the evangelist’s refusal to compromise the power of God in the face of suffering. The scene is terrible, not because Jesus must suffer, but because his suffering is the will of the God who is powerful enough to prevent it, and who has eliminated so much suffering in the narrative prior to this scene. What makes discipleship in the Markan community so difficult is not that it involves suffering, but that it involves suffering by those who participate in God’s power to do the impossible.”
It goes without saying that Mary the mother of Jesus was a great woman of prayer. Her Magnificat in Luke’s Gospel is deeply influenced by the prayer of Hannah in 1 Sam 2:1-10. The Catechism also mentions that she prays for us as our gracious advocate. Her influence on Jesus at the marriage feast of Cana illustrates that point. As one Marian prayer puts it, “Never was it known that anyone who fled to your protection, implored your help or sought your intercession was left unaided.” Not surprisingly, Mary was the one who was most instrumental in teaching her son how to pray. She would have taught him the main Jewish prayers, as well as introducing him to the psalms, and prayer as conversation with God.
