“Our” Father
In just 56 words, the Our Father summarizes how we are to approach God. It combines praise and petition. It calls for surrender and understanding. This prayer puts us into a relationship with God, Who reaches down to us as a loving Father.
It also unites us with all those who are of the true Faith, as we do not address God as “my” Father but “our” Father, as The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches:
“When we invoke the Father and when each one of us calls Him our Father, we are to understand thereby that from the privilege and gift of divine adoption it necessarily follows that all the faithful are brethren and should love each other as such: You are all brethren for one is your Father Who is in Heaven. [Matt. 23:8] This is why the Apostles in their Epistles address all the faithful as brethren.”
The word “our” also obliges us to work toward the salvation of our fellow man. On this point, and the fraternal charity which it induces, the Roman Catechism further explains:
“How sincere should be the manner in which we ought to utter the word our, we learn from St. Chrysostom. God, he says, listens willingly to the Christian who prays not only for himself but for others; because to pray for ourselves is an inspiration of nature; but to pray for others is an inspiration of grace; necessity compels us to pray for ourselves, whereas fraternal charity calls on us to pray for others. And he adds: That prayer which is inspired by fraternal charity is more agreeable to God than that which is dictated by necessity.”
Indeed, the fraternal spirit which must animate this prayer is so important that the Catechism further reminds priests:
“In connection with the important subject of salutary prayer, the pastor should be careful to remind and exhort all the faithful of every age, condition and rank, never to forget the bonds of universal brotherhood that bind them, and consequently ever to treat each other as friends and brothers, and never to seek arrogantly to raise themselves above their neighbors.”
Only Known by Divine Revelation
By praying the Lord’s Prayer, we affirm the truth of our divine sonship: “For you are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:26). The Catechism of St. Pius X concisely affirms the same sentiments: “In the beginning of the Lord’s Prayer we call God Our Father, to foster confidence in His infinite goodness by the remembrance that we are His children.”
Most Christians are not sufficiently impressed by the depth of this truth. Sadly, most of us take it for granted. Yet God as a loving father who adopts His creatures as sons is a unique aspect of Christian revelation. No ancient pagans ever conceived of the gods as having such a relationship with men. This concept is foreign to Hinduism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Confucianism, Islam, and all other major world religions, all of which are false. Even Judaism from the Old Testament (or its later aberrations under midrashic, kabbalah, or occult influences) fails to convey the concept of God as Abba, Father. Truly, this is a teaching which men could not know without the express revelation of Jesus Christ, the only Son of God.
The Fatherly Care of God
Both Scripture and Tradition teach us that through faith and Baptism, we receive “the spirit of adoption” (Rom. 8:15) and become true children of God. This awesome reality of divine sonship permits us to pray to God as our “Father.” The Roman Catechism explains the importance of the word “Father” at the beginning of the Lord’s Prayer:
- Our Lord chose Father as the first word to inspire confidence and love in those who pray and ask anything of God, and to convey the idea of indulgence and tenderness.
- Our Lord did not choose to start the prayer with some other word conveying the idea of majesty (e.g., Lord or Creator) because it might rather inspire fear.
- The reasons why Father is applicable to God can be easily explained when considered in light of creation, Divine Providence, and redemption.
The Catechism next specifies three primary reasons for why we refer to God as “Father”: He created us, He provides for us, and He cares for us. Beyond creating us and caring for us in His Providence, Almighty God has shown us His fatherly love above all in Christ’s act of redemption accomplished on the Cross and made present again at every Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Good Fathers Discipline Their Children
God is our Creator, our Provider and Defender, and our Redeemer. And the awareness of this sublime reality necessarily obliges us to the duties of love, piety, obedience, and respect. Even if God chastises us, we must see in trials the wisdom of a truly loving Father Who orders all things for our ultimate good while respecting our free will. On this crucial point, the Roman Catechism saliently reminds us that as His faithful children we should:
- recognize in such chastisements the fatherly love of God;
- ever have in our hearts and lips “the saying of Job, the most patient of men: He woundeth and cureth; He striketh and His hands shall heal [Job 5:18];”
- “repeat frequently the words of Jeremias spoken in the name of God’s people: Thou hast chastised me and I was instructed, as a young bullock unaccustomed to the yoke: convert me and I shall be converted; for Thou art the Lord my God [Jer. 31:18];”
- keep before our eyes “the example of Tobias who, recognizing in the loss of his sight the paternal hand of God raised against him, cried out: I bless thee, O Lord God of Israel, because Thou hast chastised me and Thou hast saved me. [Tob. 11:17]”
- be particularly on guard against believing that any calamity or affliction that befalls us “can take place without the knowledge of God; for we have His own words: A hair of your heads shall not perish. [Luke 21:18]”
- find consolation in that divine oracle: “Those whom I love I rebuke and chastise [Apoc. 3:19]”
Who Art in Heaven
As we know from both reason and revelation, God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent – that is, present everywhere. Why, then, did Our Lord teach us to say, “Who art in Heaven”? The Roman Catechism explains:
- Though God is present in all places and in all things, without being bound by any limits, Sacred Scripture frequently states that He has His dwelling in Heaven.
- “And the reason is because the heavens which we see above our heads are the noblest part of the world, remain ever incorruptible, surpass all other bodies in power, grandeur and beauty, and are endowed with fixed and regular motion.
- “God, then, in order to lift up the minds of men to contemplate His infinite power and majesty, which are so preeminently visible in the work of the heavens, declares in Sacred Scripture that Heaven is His dwelling place.
- “Yet at the same time He often affirms, what indeed is most true, that there is no part of the universe to which He is not present intimately by His nature and His power.”
Conclusion
The Roman Catechism, unlike so many other catechisms, insightfully and thoroughly instructs on the meaning of the Lord’s Prayer and various practical considerations related to it. The next time we pray this all-holy prayer, let us pause and reflect on the words “Our Father, Who art in Heaven” and give thanks that we, mere creatures, are able to call the God of the universe by the name of Father.