MONDAY, March 15

Mark 7:24-37. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, "Ephphatha," that is, "Be opened."

Anthony Bloom, archbishop of the Eastern Orthodox Church in England, records that one of the first people to seek his advice after his ordination was an elderly lady. "I have been praying almost unceasingly for fourteen years," she said, "and I have never had any sense of God's presence." It appeared that her prayer times were filled with her talking, so Anthony Bloom suggested that she set apart fifteen minutes a day to "sit and just knit before the face of God." The woman later reported that when she talked to God she felt nothing, but when she sat quietly she felt wrapped in his presence.

When we wish that we had more recorded prayers of Jesus, it may be that we too regard prayer predominantly as conversation. In today's reading, Jesus is not in solitude but fully engaged at the point of human need. Prayer consisted of a look towards heaven and a sigh. Maybe there was no time for more than this. But could it be that even on the lonely hillsides Jesus often simply looked toward his Father, and the uplifted spirit was the prayer? Prayer can be a trustful waiting, a single word or sentence, a look of hope. (1975)

PRAY for the Diocese of Brasilia (Igreja Episcopal Anglicana do Brasil)

Ps 89:1-18 * 89:19-52; Genesis 49:1-28; 1 Corinthians 10:14-11:1

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