January 14, 2026

By Father William Muench
NCC columnist

My next presentation for the OCIA group is in a couple of weeks on prayer and living a prayerful life. I know there are many books and articles written about prayer. What I decided to do was to ask AI to prepare a good outline for me to follow for my presentation on Prayer. It turned out to be a great outline. Today I would like to share with you my planned presentation – how I will follow this outline given to me.

The first thing that was mentioned for me was that this outline would be a pastoral presentation rather than an academic one, a reflection as much as an instruction. I was encouraged to begin with a question – a little discussion – “When was the last time you felt truly listened to?” You know? When I considered this, I had to take a moment to decide what my answer would be. I wonder, do people listen to my homilies? But, you know, last week I went to confession, and I know my confessor did listen to me. We believe that God listens to us in prayer.
So, I was asked to begin by considering why we pray. I believe we pray because God speaks to us first. God has touched my life in baptism and continued to reach out to me, leading up to my vocation. The Lord has blessed me with many gifts. I know that prayer was essential as I grew in faith. Prayer has helped me in discernment. Prayer has been important to show me how to live a good life. And also, prayer has been important in perseverance when life brought me trails.

Scripture teaches us that Jesus prayed often and is our best teacher of prayer. Jesus prayed before making major decisions as when he chose the first apostles. Jesus prayed at time of joy and sorrow as at the Last Supper. Jesus prayed in solitude and in silence. We know that he taught the apostles the Lord’s Prayer. This prayer begins with petitions of praise and a call to forgiveness. Each time we pray the Our Father, we pledge to depend on our God.

Basically, there are four forms of prayer: There is adoration – loving God for who He is. There is contrition – being a humble sinner before God and seeking forgiveness to change life and draw closer to the Lord. There is Thanksgiving – praying in gratitude to God for his blessings and his guidance to lead us to a live a grateful life. Then there is prayer of supplication – a time to bring our needs and the needs of others to the Lord. Each time we celebrate Mass, each of these forms of prayer form part of this prayer.

There is time of struggle in prayer that we must learn to solve. There are distractions, and we must develop ways to bring our mind and heart and attention back to prayer, possibly by pausing to say a familiar prayer. Then there is dryness; we know that many great saints wrote about times when God did not seem to be involved. The Lord teaches us that God is ever present to us even when prayer feels empty.

Prayer and the Sacraments – our best prayer as a Catholic is the Mass. In the sacrament of reconciliation, we stand before the Lord humbly and honestly praying for God’s forgiveness and guidance. We pray as we live and we live as we pray. Prayer leads to action, charity and peace. There are so many times that we should enrich our day with short prayers. We should learn to be ready to offer even ordinary moments to our God with a short prayer.

I encourage you to find something practical like a frequent moment of prayer each day – maybe a stop for a few minutes of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament in a visit to a Church.