579. What is the place of the Our Father in the Scriptures?

579. What is the place of the Our Father in the Scriptures?   

(Comp 579) The Our Father is the “summary of the whole Gospel” (Tertullian), “the perfect prayer” (Saint Thomas Aquinas). Found in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), it presents in the form of prayer the essential content of the Gospel.

“In brief”

(CCC 2774) "The Lord's Prayer is truly the summary of the whole gospel" (Tertullian, De orat. 1: PL 1, 1251-1255). The "most perfect of prayers" (St. Thomas Aquinas, STh II-II, 83, 9). It is at the center of the Scriptures.

To deepen and explain

(CCC 2761) The Lord's Prayer "is truly the summary of the whole gospel" (Tertullian, De orat. 1: PL 1, 1155). "Since the Lord… after handing over the practice of prayer, said elsewhere, 'Ask and you will receive,' and since everyone has petitions which are peculiar to his circumstances, the regular and appropriate prayer [the Lord's Prayer] is said first, as the foundation of further desires" (Tertullian, De orat. 10: PL 1, 1165; cf. Lk 11:9). (CCC 2762) After showing how the psalms are the principal food of Christian prayer and flow together in the petitions of the Our Father, St. Augustine concludes: Run through all the words of the holy prayers [in Scripture], and I do not think that you will find anything in them that is not contained and included in the Lord's Prayer (St. Augustine, Ep. 130, 12, 22: PL 33, 503). 

Reflection

(CCC 2763) All the Scriptures - the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms - are fulfilled in Christ (Cf. Lk 24:44). The Gospel is this "Good News." Its first proclamation is summarized by St. Matthew in the Sermon on the Mount (Cf. Mt 5- 7); The prayer to our Father is at the center of this proclamation. It is in this context that each petition bequeathed to us by the Lord is illuminated: The Lord's Prayer is the most perfect of prayers.... In it we ask, not only for all the things we can rightly desire, but also in the sequence that they should be desired. This prayer not only teaches us to ask for things, but also in what order we should desire them (St. Thomas Aquinas, STh II-II, 83, 9). (CCC 2764) The Sermon on the Mount is teaching for life, the Our Father is a prayer; but in both the one and the other the Spirit of the Lord gives new form to our desires, those inner movements that animate our lives. Jesus teaches us this new life by his words; he teaches us to ask for it by our prayer. The rightness of our life in him will depend on the rightness of our prayer. 

(Next question: Why is it called the “Lord’s Prayer”?)