'n Gebed van hoop

'n Lang, meditatiewe, inhoudryke gebed van Rahner:

We pray, God of grace and eternal life, that you may increase in us and strengthen in us hope.  Grant us this virtue of the strong, this power of the confident, this courage of the unshaken.  Let us always have a longing for you who are the infinite fulfillment of our life, let us always count on you and your faithfulness, let us always unflinchingly hold onto your power, let us be of such a mind, shape in us such a mind by your Holy Spirit, for then, our Lord and God, will we have the virtue of hope.  Then we can tackle the task of our life with courage, then there will live in us the joyous confidence of not laboring in vain, then we will do our work knowing that you the Almighty One are at work in us and through us and, wherever our strength fails, without us for your glory and to our salvation in the ways you see fit.  Strengthen in us your hope.

But the true hope of glory, eternal God, is your only begotten Son.  He is the one possessing your eternal nature from eternity to eternity because you gave it to him and continue to do so, in eternal creation, so that he owns everything that we hope and long for; he is wisdom and power, beauty and goodness, life and glory, everything in all.  And he, this your Son to whom you have given everything, he has become one of us.  He became human.  Your eternal word, God of Glory, has become flesh, has become like one of us, has lowered himself and accepted human form, a human body, a human soul, a human life, a human fate all the way to its most terrible possibilities.  Your son, Holy Father, has truly become human.  In adoration we bend our knee.  For who can conceive of the incomprehensibility of your love?  You loved the world so much that people still take offense at your love and call the message about your son’s becoming human foolishness and nonsense.  Yet, we believe in this incomprehensibility, the burning courage of your love.  And because we believe, we can rejoice in blessed hope: Christ in us is the hope of glory.  For when you give us your son, what else could there be that you are holding back, what else could you be refusing?  When we possess your son, to whom you have given everything, including your own nature, what could still be lacking?  And he is truly ours.  For he is the son of Mary, who in Adam is our sister; he is a child of the family of Adam, he is one nature with us, he is of the same being and origins as humans.  And when we humans are to form one great community by virtue of our nature and destiny according to your plan and your creator’s will, then we share as poor children of Eve’s the nature and the destiny of your own son.  We are brothers of the firstborn, the only begotten, brothers of your son, heirs in his glory.  We participate in his mercy, in his spirit, in his life, in his destiny of cross and glory, in his eternal majesty.  No longer do we live our life, but Christ, our brother does, who lives his life in us and through us.  Look at us, Father of Jesus Christ and our father, and see that we are prepared to participate in the life of your son.  Transform our life and make it resemble the life of your son.  He wishes to continue to live his life in us until the end of time; he wants to reveal in us and in our life the majesty, the greatness, the beauty, and the salvific power of his life.  What we encounter in life is not coincidence, not blind destiny, but a piece of the life of your son.  We want to receive joy as the joy of Christ, success as his success, pain as his pain, suffering as his suffering, work as his work, death as participation in his death.

Consequently, we pray especially for your grace to allow us to take part in the life of Jesus.  Allow us to participate in Jesus as the one who is praying.  He is the great worshiper of God in spirit and in truth; he is the mediator through whom alone our prayer can penetrate to the throne of grace.  In him we want to pray, united by his prayer.  He, with whom we are one in spirit, has taught us to pray.  He taught us to pray the way he himself prayed: praying at all times and not giving up, praying persistently, confidently, humbly, in spirit and in truth, in genuine love of one’s neighbor without which no prayer before you can ever be pleasing.  May he teach us to pray for what he prayed for: that your name be glorified, that your will be done, that your kingdom come, for when we pray like that for the sake of your honor, then you will also hear us when we are praying for ourselves, our earthly well-being, help with our earthly sorrows.  Grant us the spirit of prayer, of collectedness, and of union with you.

Lord, take my poor heart.  It is often so far from you.  It is like waterless, dry land, lost in a thousand things and in the trifles that fill up my everyday life.  Lord, only you can collect the thoughts of my heart and have it concentrate on you, you who are the center of all hearts, the Lord of all souls.  Only you can bestow the spirit of prayer, only your grace is able to allow me to find you amidst this multitude of things, amidst the distractions of everyday life, you, the one necessity, the one person with whom my heart can become still.  May your spirit assist me in my weakness, and when I do not know for what I should be praying, then may the spirit intercede for me with groaning too deep for words, and you as the one who knows hearts will listen to what your spirit in me desires when making its intercession.

Finally, I pray for the most difficult and hardest thing: for the grace to recognize the suffering of my life as the cross of your son, to worship in him your holy, unsearchable will, to follow your son on his walk with the cross for as long as it may please you.  Allow me to become sensitive to your glory and not merely my own well-being, for then I will be able to carry many a cross as the penance for my sins.  Do not allow me become bitter on account of suffering, but rather help me to become mature, patient, selfless, mild, and full of longing for the country in which there is no sorrow and for the day when you will wipe away every tear from the eyes of those who have loved you and who, while in pain and darkness, have believed in your love and your light.  Allow my suffering to be a confession of my faith in your promises, a confession of my hope in your mercy and faithfulness, a confession of my love to show that I love you more than myself, that I love for your sake without gain.  May the cross of my Lord be an example to me, a strength to me, a solace to me, the solution to all hidden doubt, the light of all nights.

Grant that we may glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; grant that we may become so mature in true Christian stature and life that we will no longer consider the cross as a disaster and an unintelligible contradiction but as the sign of your choosing us, as the secret and certain sign that we belong to you for all eternity.  Your word is faithful and says that when we allow ourselves to die with him, we will also live with him; when we persevere with him, we will also reign with him.  Lord, we want to share everything with your son, his life, his divine glory and, hence, also his pain and his death.  Only grant us along with the cross the strength to carry it.  Allow us to experience also the blessing of the cross, and place on our shoulders that cross which in your wisdom you see as being to our salvation and not to our demise.

Son of the Father, Christ, you who are living in us, you are the hope of our glory.  Live in us, subject our life to the norms of your life, make our life like yours.  Live in me, pray in me, suffer in me, for no more than that do I ask.  For when I have you, I am rich.  Those who have found you have found the strength and victory for their life.

Amen.