In the gospel passage today Jesus teaches us the perfect prayer! In this, Luke's version, it is very brief and to the point – though it still has seven major points: calling God FATHER (an enormously important point – he is our Father, we are therefore his children); calling his name "holy" because it is the fullness of life and love; proclaiming that the "kingdom of God will come" especially in us who believe it and live like it is on the way and is in effect already begun; asking for "daily bread" – for the things we actually and truly need which God will provide because he is Father / Provider / Sustainer; asking for forgiveness of our own sins (which is now possible because of the merits of Jesus' death and resurrection) but only insofar as we are willing to and actually do forgive others who sin against us in anyway whatsoever at all; and to save us from the final test that would be most difficult to pass: a test in which the power of evil would win out over us.
This prayer touches everything that is truly important in our lives as Christians. Giving God what belongs to him, and asking him to give us what we needs to be good children, so that we can end up in the heavenly home he has prepared for us! If any of our individual prayers do not fit somewhere in these above listed categories – then they are "less than perfect" – and just may not be answered close to the way we would want them to be answered.
In the first reading today we see that when we do pray, when we are open to the movement of the Spirit within us, when the Truth of God takes root in us – we have the ability sometime to see things clearly in a way that can be useful for correction. St. Paul corrected St. Peter (of all people) because Peter was being narrow-minded and a bit prejudiced regarding who should be admitted to the Church and how? He said that Peter had no problem "living like a Gentile" – but that as far as the Gentiles living like Peter (like a mainstream Christian) there were difficulties due to circumcision and other religious practices.
Paul straightened out Peter on the matter; and we, when we are sure that we are in the right about a particular matter that has depth and substance, have the duty and obligation – in a charitable and peaceable way – to make our position known so that Truth may win out, not us! We must never "glory" in having our own way – but always "rejoice that the Truth be told" in all things!
The Truth of the matter is: we have received the spirit of adoption through which we can all cry out: ABBA! FATHER!
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