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NEWS BRIEFS
March 20, 2018 | The Valley Catholic
It Takes More than One ‘Our Father’
to Ask for God’s Help, Pope Says
By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY -- Praying for God’s
intercession takes courage, dogged per-
sistence and patience, said Pope Francis.
“If I want the Lord to listen to what I
am asking him, I have to go, and go and
go -- knock on the door and knock on
God’s heart,” the pope said in his homily
March 15 at morning Mass in the Domus
Sanctae Marthae.
“We cannot promise someone we
will pray for him or her and then say
an ‘Our Father’ and a ‘Hail Mary’ and
then leave it at that. No. If you say you’ll
pray for another, you have to take this
path. And you need patience,” he said.
Pope Francis’ homily focused on the
day’s reading from the Book of Exodus
(32:7-14), in which God tells Moses how
angry he is that his people have created
a golden calf to worship as their god.
God threatens to unleash his wrath on
them and promises Moses, “Then I will
make of you a great nation.”
Pope Francis said Moses does not
take the bait or get involved in “games
of bribery.” Moses sticks by his people
and does not “sell his conscience” for
his own gain, the pope said.
“And God likes this. When God sees
a soul, a person who prays and prays
and prays for something, he is moved.”
Moses had the courage to speak
“face-to-face” and truthfully to the Lord,
he said, and successfully implored God
to relent and not punish his people.
“For prayers of intercession, you
need two things: courage, that is, ‘par-
rhesia,’ and patience,” he said.
People’s hearts must be truly in-
vested in the thing or person they are
praying for; otherwise not even courage
and patience will be enough to keep go-
ing, he added.
People should ask God for the grace
to pray frankly and freely to God, as
sons and daughters would talk to their
father, knowing that “my father will
listen to me,” Pope Francis said.
Catholics, Muslims Urged to
Look Inward First in Interreligious Efforts
MUNDELEIN, Ill. (CNS) – Taking
on the issue of religious prejudice,
the National Muslim and Catholic
Dialogue met for the third time at
University of Saint Mary of the Lake/
Mundelein Seminary March 6-8. An-
nounced in February 2016, the national
dialogue, which is sponsored by the
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’
Committee on Ecumenical and Inter-
religious Affairs, aims to show public
support for Islamic American com-
munities. It builds on three regional
Catholic-Muslim dialogues – mid-
Atlantic, Midwest and West Coast
– that have taken place for more than
20 years. Chicago Cardinal Blase J.
Cupich co-chairs the dialogue with
Sayyid Syeed, national director of the
Islamic Society of North America’s
Office of Interfaith and Community
Alliances. During the March 7 public
portion of the dialogue, Rita George-
Tvrtkovic, associate professor of theol-
ogy at Benedictine University in Lisle,
and Irfan Omar, associate professor of
theology at Marquette University in
Milwaukee, delivered remarks around
the theme “One God, One Humanity:
Confronting Religious Prejudice.”
Vatican Official Urges Support for
Mideast Christians on Good Friday
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Christians
in the Middle East, particularly those
who have been forced from their homes
by violence and persecution, need
the support of the Catholic Church,
a Vatican official said. “Let us show
them concretely our closeness, through
our constant prayer and through our
monetary aid,” said Cardinal Leonardo
Sandri, prefect of the Congregation
for Eastern Churches. Such support is
especially key now that the Ninevah
Plain in Iraq has been liberated from
Islamic State and “most Iraqi Christians
and Syrians want to return to their own
land where their houses were destroyed,
with schools, hospitals and churches
devastated. Let us not leave them alone,”
he said in a letter sent to bishops around
the world. The Va