“Loving contemplation, typical of the most intimate prayer, does not need many words…” Pope Francis made this heartwarming observation during his private General Audience today, May 5, on prayer, which was streamed again from the Pope’s apostolic library.
This comes as Italy continues to battle coronavirus and its variants. While it has begun to lift some restrictions, many limitations remain in place across the country.
During his catechesis, Pope Francis reminded how for Christians, contemplative prayer is an act of the heart by which we fix our gaze in faith upon Jesus, quietly pondering His word and His saving mysteries. “As the simple farmer of Ars told Saint John Vianney: in praying before the Tabernacle, “I look at Him and He looks at me,’” the Jesuit Pope recalled.
His Loving Gaze Purifies Our Hearts
“By gazing on our Lord in this way,” Francis said, “we come to feel His loving gaze upon us and our hearts are purified.”
“I look at Him and He looks at me!” It is like this: loving contemplation, typical of the most intimate prayer, does not need many words. A gaze is enough,” the Pope expressed, underscoring: “It is enough to be convinced that our life is surrounded by an immense and faithful love from which nothing can ever separate us.”
This in turn, the Pope pointed out, enables us to see others in the light of that truth and compassion which Jesus brings to all.
Christ the Model
Christ Himself, the Roman Pontiff reminded, is the model for all contemplative prayer, noting that amid the activity of His public ministry, He always found time for a prayer that expressed his loving communion with the Father. At the Transfiguration, for instance, he noted how Jesus prepared the disciples for His coming Passion and Death by enabling them to contemplate his divine glory.
“Through our prayer, may we persevere in union with him on the path of love where contemplation and charity become one,” he prayed.
The Holy Father reminded that we are taught with Saint John of the Cross, “the Church’s great master of contemplative prayer,” that: “one act of pure love is more useful to the Church than all the other works put together.”
Continuing his series of catecheses on Christian prayer, this week he focused on contemplative prayer.
Below is the full text of Pope Francis’ General Audience. The full English translation of the Pope’s pronounced words was provided by the Vatican:
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Catechesis on prayer: 32. Contemplative Prayer
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
We continue the catechesis on prayer and in this catechesis, I would like to reflect on contemplative prayer.
The contemplative dimension of the human being – which is not yet contemplative prayer – is a bit like the “salt” of life: it gives flavour, it seasons our day. We can contemplate by gazing at the sun that rises in the morning, or at the trees that deck themselves out in spring green; we can contemplate by listening to music or to the sounds of the birds, reading a book, gazing at a work of art or at that masterpiece that is the human face… Carlo Maria Martini, when he was sent to be the Bishop of Milan, entitled his first Pastoral Letter The contemplative dimension of life: the truth is that those who live in a large city, where everything – we can say – is artificial and where everything is functional, risk losing the capacity to contemplate. To contemplate is not primarily a way of doing, but a way of being. To be contemplative.
And being contemplatives does not depend on the eyes, but on the heart. And here prayer enters into play as an act of faith and love, as the “breath” of our relationship with God. Prayer purifies the heart and, with it, also sharpens our gaze, allowing it to grasp reality from another point of view. The Catechism describes this transformation of the heart that prayer effects, citing a famous testimony of the Holy Curé of Ars who said this: “Contemplation is a gaze of faith, fixed on Jesus. ‘I look at him and he looks at me’: this is what a certain peasant of Ars used to say to the holy curé while praying before the tabernacle. […] The light of the countenance of Jesus illumines the eyes of our heart and teaches us to see everything in the light of his truth and his compassion for all men” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2715). Everything comes from this: from a heart that feels that it is looked on with love. Then reality is contemplated with different eyes.
“I look at Him and He looks at me!” It is like this: loving contemplation, typical of the most intimate prayer, does not need many words. A gaze is enough. It is enough to be convinced that our life is surrounded by an immense and faithful love that nothing can ever separate us from.
Jesus was a master of this gaze. His life never lacked the time, space, silence, the loving communion that allows one’s existence not to be devastated by the inevitable trials, but to maintain beauty intact. His secret is his relationship with his heavenly Father.
Let’s think, for example, about the Transfiguration. The Gospels place this episode at the critical point of Jesus’s mission when opposition and rejection were mounting all around Him. Even among his disciples, many did not understand him and left him; one of the Twelve harboured traitorous thoughts. Jesus began to speak openly of his suffering and death that awaited him in Jerusalem. It is in this context that Jesus climbs up a high mountain with Peter, James and John. The Gospel of Mark says: “He was transfigured before them, and his garments became glistening, intensely white, as no fuller on earth could bleach them” (9:2-3). Right at the moment in which Jesus is not understood – they were going away him, they were leaving him alone because they did not understand – in this moment that he is misunderstood, just when everything seems to become blurred in a whirlwind of misunderstanding, that is where a divine light shines. It is the light of the Father’s love that fills the Son’s heart and transfigures his entire Person.
Some spiritual masters of the past understood contemplation as opposed to action, and exalted those vocations that flee from the world and its problems to dedicate oneself entirely to prayer. In reality, Jesus Christ, in his person and the Gospel, there is no opposition between contemplation and action. No. In the Gospel and in Jesus there is no contradiction. This may have come from the influence of some Neoplatonic philosophy that creates this opposition, but it surely contains a dualism that is not part of the Christian message.
There is only one great call, one great call in the Gospel, and it is that of following Jesus on the way of love. This is the summit and it is the centre of everything. In this sense, charity and contemplation are synonymous, they say the same thing. Saint John of the Cross believed that a small act of pure love is more useful to the Church than all the other works combined. What is born of prayer and not from the presumption of our ego, what is purified by humility, even if it is a hidden and silent act of love, is the greatest miracle that a Christian can perform. And this is the path of contemplative prayer: I look at Him and He looks at me. It is that act of love in silent dialogue with Jesus that does so much good for the Church. Thank you.
Special Greetings
I cordially greet the English-speaking faithful. United in this month of May with Our Blessed Lady, may we grow in contemplation of the glory of the risen Saviour. I invoke upon you and your families the mercy and peace of God our Father. May the Lord bless you!
In this month of May, led by the shrines scattered throughout the world, we are reciting the Rosary to pray for the end of the pandemic and for the resumption of social activity and work. Today, the Shrine of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary in Namyang, South Corea will lead this Marian prayer. We unite ourselves to all those gathered in this shrine, praying especially for children and adolescents.
[Vatican-provided text]
[Original language: Italian]
